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Paul is famous for his essay about Lisp - arguing that his startup beat other startups because Lisp is such a better language than C++ or Java which his competi
by scottjg 5y ago
Paul is famous for his essay about Lisp - arguing that his startup beat other startups because Lisp is such a better language than C++ or Java which his competitors were using.
Unclear to me if this is really the meaningful reason that Paul's company succeeded (I'd say obsession with programming languages can be a counter-indicator for productivity), but it clearly resonated with a lot of people since that essay is arguably the onramp into Paul's fame. A lot of programmers read that essay back in 2001. His popularity as an investor who understood engineers arguably catapulted YCombinator
- FpUser 5y agoI think that whatever his achievements, those are the result of his business savvy and being able to execute. Praising Lisp just shows that it is his favorite language and he's using his clout to promote it, nothing is wrong about it of course. But as I've already said I believe that he could've used plenty of other languages with exactly the same outcome business wise.
- bcrosby95 5y agoI don't think he was obsessed with languages. He picked the one he knew best. I also think the whole blub thing becomes less and less relevant with every passing day. Every language has evolved significantly over the last 20 years - when he wrote that article - much less the last 26 years since he started viaweb. I personally prefer FP languages. I don't think they give me magical superpowers... okay, well, maybe BEAM languages in certain circumstances. But I also know people that work magic with C and do things I could never dream of.