Subject: Re: What I want from my Common Lisp vendor and the Common Lisp community
From: Erik Naggum <erik@naggum.net>
Date: Sat, 01 Sep 2001 20:01:21 GMT
Newsgroups: comp.lang.lisp
Message-ID: <3208363275039616@naggum.net>

* Erann Gat
> You are wrong, Erik Naggum.  Do you really think C++ and Java thrive
> because people love them?  Ridiculous.  Languages thrive because people
> *use* them, not because people love them.  So Erik, please stop trying to
> convince people to love Common Lisp.  Your brand of love is poison.

  Let us look at the "substance" in this claim.  There is my argument that
  there is a love-hate axis on which Common Lisp is not sufficiently loved,
  and by that it is clearly _understood_ that it is not sufficiently used.
  In fact, the whole point with the love-hate axis was to explain the lack
  of use.  But this axis is ridiculous, according to master mind Erann Gat.
  Instead, there is the love-use axis, where the more languages are loved,
  the less they are used and vice versa, take loathsome language C++ and
  loathsome language Java as additional examples to support the loved, but
  not used Common Lisp.  In fact, if people express their love for Common
  Lisp, they would poison something (langauge, themselves, both?) and die
  or at least not use it.  In order to increase the usage of a language, it
  is precisely the people who defame the language, denigrate the standard
  and the process that created it, and generally speak ill of any and all
  features in the language, that truly help.  The less people love Common
  Lisp, the more they will use it, according to master mind Erann Gat,
  because to him, loathsome language C++ and loathsome language Java set
  the standard by which Common Lisp should measure its success.  In order
  to be used, you must not be loved.  That sounds to me like a recipe for a
  really, really bad relationship, but despite everything I know about C++
  and Java, even its users do not think that way.  After all, it is not
  master mind Erann Gat's lack of love for C++ or Java that drives anybody
  else to use it.  Or maybe those _are_ the languages they choose when they
  have been driven away by false alarms about Common Lisp companies being
  out of business and other random and assorted evil perpetrated against
  Common Lisp and its user community by master mind Erann Gat.

  Of f*ing _course_ C++ and Java thrive because people love them, you twit!
  (Politeness master Erann Gat has approved "you twit" as non-insulting.)
  It requires an evil mind of biblical proprotions to believe that those
  who sat down to create C++ and Java failed to understand that they had to
  draw on the _excitement_ of its user community, and instead thought they
  could start off with people _using_ their stuff.  Bjarne Stroustrup's own
  accounts of how this started and got rolling is a virtual roller coaster
  of excitement and user satisfaction.  How do people start using something?
  How do people continue to use something?  Even if somebody orders them
  them around, they have to be _ordered_ by someone.  Unless you are master
  mind Erann Gat, I must presume, you do not choose things you hate.  You
  do not even choose things towards which you are indifferent.  You choose
  things according to a value scale, and preferably the topmost value if
  you can get it -- and if not, something else has higher value that makes
  the topmost thing lose value, such as being an out-of-budget experience.

  What I am doing here is revoking people's "license to hate Common Lisp",
  or at least trying to.  John Foderaro set up this whole stupid election
  thing and wanted to see the community split into those who supported him
  and those who supprted me.  I do not want _personal_ support, however.  I
  want people to support Common Lisp and cease and desist in negative and
  destructive marketing practices.  Like Erann Gat thinks it is important
  to warn the world against me because _he_ picked a fantastically stupid
  fight and lost, some of the people who have a deep desire to warn the
  world against Common Lisp have staged fights or even wars and lost, and
  cannot get over it.  Such people have no business trying to destroy any
  other person's appreciation for what they dislike, but that is what such
  vengeful, negative people do.  This community is not big enough to be
  able to drown such individuals in an ocean of enthusiasm and positive
  feedback, and thus they make things worse out of proportion.

  The love-use axis is _obviously_ wrong.  It has absolutely no predictive
  power and just assumes that "use begets use" at best, "use begets hatred"
  at worst.  People who think this is smart or even good should have their
  head examined by a professional.

///