Back in the 40s and 50s, engineers designed stuff that was rock solid.
By the 1970's the XLR had become pretty much the standard. It's pretty rock solid and easy enough to use.
There have been some attempts at different connectors, trying to make them cheaper or smaller, but the potential advantages aren't great enough to create an entire different standard. While smaller connectors would seem desirable, in reality a smaller connector would be much harder to fix in the field and would likely be less durable.
What's really crazy is the 1/4" connector is still around. That was created way back in the 1800's when telephone switchboards were getting started. The good news is construction and materials have resulted in much more reliable connectors, although still problematic compared to the XLR.
