[yusina]

> Why has nobody come along and created an alternative standard library yet?

Because people are so terribly opinionated that the only common denominator is that the existing thing is bad. For every detail that somebody will argue a modern version should have, there will be somebody else arguing the exact opposite. Both will be highly opinionated and for each of them there is probably some scenario in which they are right.

So, the inability of the community to agree on what "good" even means, plus the extreme heterogenity of the use cases for C is probably the answer to your question.