6 ms·

Why, time and time again, does Guido seem incapable of reasonable debate, or ideas that challenge his own? It's completely rude to interrupt a presenter with '

by axaxs 7y ago

Why, time and time again, does Guido seem incapable of reasonable debate, or ideas that challenge his own? It's completely rude to interrupt a presenter with 'what is your point?' Years ago I was in contact with the author of Nuitka, who was very excited to share his work thus far. During his presentation, Guido kept huffing and making snide comments under his breath. All because he disagrees with the premise behind Nuitka. I like Python, and can appreciate his work and contributions. That said, I can't help think the community can become less toxic without him as BDFL.

michael_j_ward 7y ago
Guido resigned as BDFL in July of 2018[0]. [0] https://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-committers/2018-July/005664.html https://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-committers/2018-Jul...
- axaxs 7y ago
  Apologies if it wasn't clear, but that's what I was alluding to. A lot of folks, and to an extent myself, feel that it will become a worse, design by committee language. I was just trying to point out the upside.
tyingq 7y ago
Reading the article, she seemed to handle it well, and he stormed off.
pavlov 7y ago
Maybe he’s simply burnt out? The pressure of being in charge of something as big as Python must be intense. People make demands on his time and expect the “benevolent dictator” to cunningly solve everything like a modern day Salomon. I know he gave up the title, but as he personifies Python, I imagine the influx of requests for his attention may not have subsided much.
- mlevental 7y ago
  how is that an excuse for being uncivil? if you're burnt out then don't attend the talk? simple.
  - pavlov 7y ago
    From my own past experience with depression, it’s not as simple as “I’ll just stop doing all the things that have kept me in motion until now.” This is not meant to speculate on van Rossum’s health, just trying to point out that there are situations where apparent rudeness may be out of the person’s immediate control.
    - newen 7y ago
      You can say the same thing about anyone doing anything. It's just giving excuses for bad behavior.
      - yjftsjthsd-h 7y ago
        Yes. It is an excuse, even for poor behavior.
    - geofft 7y ago
      If you're sufficiently in control of your actions to keep developing a major programming language, you're sufficiently in control of your actions to either not be rude while doing so or be aware that you're going to be rude and need to find a way of dealing with the situation (avoiding it, taking extra time before speaking, working with a therapist, whatever). Mental health issues don't excuse bad behavior. (Also, personally, if I were behaving poorly I would much prefer people to say "hm, 'geofft is being rude but I know he's a better person than that and can improve" and not "hm, 'geofft is being rude, that's just the way he is, I wonder if he's got mental health problems.")
      - phyzome 7y ago
        > Mental health issues don't excuse bad behavior. Basically agreed. > If you're sufficiently in control of your actions to keep developing a major programming language, you're sufficiently in control of your actions to [...] not be rude while doing so [...] That's a lovely thought, but no. When I've had bad times, my social skills and emotional cope would sometimes go to shit and leave my technical skills intact.
userbinator 7y ago
It seems that those programming language communities which have a more "social" aspect also tends to lead to more associated drama like this.
- FranzFerdiNaN 7y ago
  It's one of the things I really like about the R community. It's incredibly friendly and without egos, and has lots of people who actively work to make the community as safe and welcoming for everybody. I can't say I've ever heard about drama like this from there.
  - new4thaccount 7y ago
    R is one of the few languages that I actually use a little bit, yet know absolutely nothing of the community and history. I mean I could tell you all about a dozen niche languages from Lisp to Haskell, but nothing of this masterpiece. Time to go read up on R :). Any chance you could give a short little blurb for how the community is organized and works? I'm curious how different it is to Python. I also sometimes worry about the future of R where you have Python-Pandas coupled with Spyder IDE and Julia-DataFrame library with Atom-Juno as IDE as well as JuliaDB. It seems like a lot of communities are moving in on what R does best.
- geofft 7y ago
  Seems like there might be some other confounding factors here: - A language that is simply less active or whose users feel less ability to have a say in the language's development is going to be both less social and less dramatic, but also carries a high chance that existing users are only there for legacy reasons and are always considering moving to another language better suited for their purposes. - A language run by a corporation is less "social," and has the drama play out in business negotiations, closed-door committee meetings, and lawsuits instead of on blogs and public mailing lists and (in this case) closed-door meetings with an expectation of public reporting. I'm not aware of any drama in the ASP community, but that probably also had something to do with many users having picked Python for their next project instead of ASP. I'm aware of some drama in the Clojure community, the conclusion of which seems to have been that Clojure is their corporate sponsor's language and if it doesn't work for you you should find something else.
stuaxo 7y ago
Yeah, it's disappointing, he seems like a bit of a dick TBH. (Though in nothing on the level of some in open source).
mixmastamyk 7y ago
It may not make complete sense, unless you are Dutch.
mixmastamyk 7y ago
What’s your point? Because it is easy to criticize an important work. Not so easy to help improve it or leave it be due to historical and compatibility concerns.

by axaxs 7y ago

michael_j_ward 7y ago

Guido resigned as BDFL in July of 2018[0]. [0] https://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-committers/2018-July/005664.html https://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-committers/2018-Jul...

axaxs 7y ago
Apologies if it wasn't clear, but that's what I was alluding to. A lot of folks, and to an extent myself, feel that it will become a worse, design by committee language. I was just trying to point out the upside.

tyingq 7y ago

Reading the article, she seemed to handle it well, and he stormed off.

pavlov 7y ago

Maybe he’s simply burnt out? The pressure of being in charge of something as big as Python must be intense. People make demands on his time and expect the “benevolent dictator” to cunningly solve everything like a modern day Salomon. I know he gave up the title, but as he personifies Python, I imagine the influx of requests for his attention may not have subsided much.

mlevental 7y ago
how is that an excuse for being uncivil? if you're burnt out then don't attend the talk? simple.
- pavlov 7y ago
  From my own past experience with depression, it’s not as simple as “I’ll just stop doing all the things that have kept me in motion until now.” This is not meant to speculate on van Rossum’s health, just trying to point out that there are situations where apparent rudeness may be out of the person’s immediate control.
  - newen 7y ago
    You can say the same thing about anyone doing anything. It's just giving excuses for bad behavior.
    - yjftsjthsd-h 7y ago
      Yes. It is an excuse, even for poor behavior.
  - geofft 7y ago
    If you're sufficiently in control of your actions to keep developing a major programming language, you're sufficiently in control of your actions to either not be rude while doing so or be aware that you're going to be rude and need to find a way of dealing with the situation (avoiding it, taking extra time before speaking, working with a therapist, whatever). Mental health issues don't excuse bad behavior. (Also, personally, if I were behaving poorly I would much prefer people to say "hm, 'geofft is being rude but I know he's a better person than that and can improve" and not "hm, 'geofft is being rude, that's just the way he is, I wonder if he's got mental health problems.")
    - phyzome 7y ago
      > Mental health issues don't excuse bad behavior. Basically agreed. > If you're sufficiently in control of your actions to keep developing a major programming language, you're sufficiently in control of your actions to [...] not be rude while doing so [...] That's a lovely thought, but no. When I've had bad times, my social skills and emotional cope would sometimes go to shit and leave my technical skills intact.

userbinator 7y ago

It seems that those programming language communities which have a more "social" aspect also tends to lead to more associated drama like this.

FranzFerdiNaN 7y ago
It's one of the things I really like about the R community. It's incredibly friendly and without egos, and has lots of people who actively work to make the community as safe and welcoming for everybody. I can't say I've ever heard about drama like this from there.
- new4thaccount 7y ago
  R is one of the few languages that I actually use a little bit, yet know absolutely nothing of the community and history. I mean I could tell you all about a dozen niche languages from Lisp to Haskell, but nothing of this masterpiece. Time to go read up on R :). Any chance you could give a short little blurb for how the community is organized and works? I'm curious how different it is to Python. I also sometimes worry about the future of R where you have Python-Pandas coupled with Spyder IDE and Julia-DataFrame library with Atom-Juno as IDE as well as JuliaDB. It seems like a lot of communities are moving in on what R does best.
geofft 7y ago
Seems like there might be some other confounding factors here: - A language that is simply less active or whose users feel less ability to have a say in the language's development is going to be both less social and less dramatic, but also carries a high chance that existing users are only there for legacy reasons and are always considering moving to another language better suited for their purposes. - A language run by a corporation is less "social," and has the drama play out in business negotiations, closed-door committee meetings, and lawsuits instead of on blogs and public mailing lists and (in this case) closed-door meetings with an expectation of public reporting. I'm not aware of any drama in the ASP community, but that probably also had something to do with many users having picked Python for their next project instead of ASP. I'm aware of some drama in the Clojure community, the conclusion of which seems to have been that Clojure is their corporate sponsor's language and if it doesn't work for you you should find something else.

stuaxo 7y ago

Yeah, it's disappointing, he seems like a bit of a dick TBH. (Though in nothing on the level of some in open source).

mixmastamyk 7y ago

It may not make complete sense, unless you are Dutch.

mixmastamyk 7y ago

What’s your point? Because it is easy to criticize an important work. Not so easy to help improve it or leave it be due to historical and compatibility concerns.