I understand and agree about the efficiency of a short powder column. But I also think that any style cartridge can be made to shoot accurately, rimmed,belted,rebated rim or rimless.
On the thinking that a cartridge should headspace off the datum line then wouldn't it make sense to make the cartridge as long as possible to get the datum line as far away from the bolt face because the case head does not fit perfectly in the bolt. Like when using iron sights, you want a long sight radius.
Having shot long range black powder for years and seen what can be done with a rimmed cartridge and rimmed bottle neck cartridgesand also shooting the other types,IMHO the companies took a page out of the benchrest book on short powder columns to use as there trick of the year to sell more guns.
I have hunted with too many people that have had problemsfeeding a hurried second shot.
eventhough this can be over come or they would not be making tactical weapons in the short, fat calibers. It comes down to sales,sales, sales.