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The Emacs community has held itself back by continuing the line of thought of resisting anything that fundamentally changes what they already have spent years l
by azinman2 7y ago
The Emacs community has held itself back by continuing the line of thought of resisting anything that fundamentally changes what they already have spent years learning and know. It's their power tool, and using tools is important for humans to do their craft. So I understand why they don't want anything to change.
Meanwhile new generations of people have different tools and aren't held onto these past ones because they didn't start with it (and they weren't coding in the 80s). The world of computing generally has moved on with new ideas, new experiences, and new form factors. So their new tooling has won them over, and outcompeted a dying generation.
This is a good thing! It's called progress. Unless Emacs is willing to have fresh blood decide a new direction for it, it will be relegated to history. If Apple held onto its Apple II vision, we wouldn't have the iPhone today. Either you are willing to fundamentally change with the times, or you aren't. Emacs has shown they aren't, and they've had over three decades to do so. Fortunately others will in their place!
- Koshkin 7y agoI can imagine a few ways emacs could be improved, but "a new direction for it," I can't.
- azinman2 7y agoAnd that's why it'll slowly go extinct.
- Oekeai 7y agoNewness contradicts creativity, because the creative process needs to result in objects that last. In fact, because new designs create a future need for more new designs, it cannot last by definition! Think of shops that sell novelty items. Newness at an object level looks like novelty items. What is the quality of novelty items? How long do novelty items last?
- azinman2 7y agoI don't understand your point. We're not talking about physical things, we're talking about software. Software is always changing, morphing, adopting, and growing user bases. It's what's amazing about it compared to hardware. My 2012 MBP runs the latest OS from approximately 8 years later, and with it a whole new slew of features and additions that both Apple and the rest of the world have brought it. Why be stuck in the past?
- Koshkin 7y ago> Why be stuck in the past? I surely would want to go back to the pre-corona days.
- Koshkin 7y agoThere's truth to that - we do not feel the need to 'upgrade' Mozart's or Titian's works, they feel just as interesting as they did when they were created (if not even more; and I am not talking about a "purely historical interest").
- Koshkin 7y agoBeen, what, 30 years, people saying that... Slowly, very slowly indeed.
- azinman2 7y agoMost of that time had far fewer developers, and far fewer alternatives. But yes, things that were once popular can very slowly die, even over decades.
- tome 7y agoemacs is Lindy. VS Code will go extinct before Emacs. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lindy_Effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lindy_Effect)
- azinman2 7y agoWe don’t know when vscode will or won’t go extinct. It’s less distinct than other similar editors in comparison to emacs, so the switching cost is a lot lower. But my point being isn’t that vscode will somehow be “the great winner,” but rather that new things will come and continue to replace the old. Emacs has/had the option of changing with the times. They’ve opted out of that. So most newcomers will opt out of emacs, and thus it’ll slowly die out.
- jerrysievert 7y agoxemacs, microemacs, memacs, etc have tried new directions in different ways. ultimately, emacs improved because of them.