Scala is known for being multi-paradigm and quite complex, with competing factions promoting different Best Ways of Doing Things. Gleam is designed to be small and simple with a single clear path for getting things done. Apart from that, Gleam leans heavily on Erlang's actor model, which IMO is one of the greatest successes of language design to date.
> Scala is ... quite complex
Do you mean the Scala language is complex or the Scala libraries (not the Scala API) that people created (e.g. Cats, Akka ...) are complex? If you say that the Scala language is complex, could you give an example?
> Erlang's actor model ... is one of the greatest successes of language design to date
IMO, if you work within 1 VM, the thread model is closest to us as almost all languages have it. How many languages the actor model is implemented in? I know Erlang, Scala. What else?