6 ms·

I think the reason the word "scam" became attached is because those outrageous and frequent claims were attached to receiving large sums of money.

oblio 3y ago
I actually forgot about that, what did they do? Ask for Patreon contributions?
- kbknapp 3y ago
  It was a combination between Patreon and Github Sponsors for solo the lead developer at the time making several thousand USD per month. Those campaigns are still ongoing AFAIK, but the contribution amounts are now private.
  - amedvednikov 3y ago
    [flagged]
    - ta20230828 3y ago
      > To quote the HN mod: the language is fine, and there's no need in these flame wars Really? In trying to counter claims about V misrepresenting things, you ... misrepresent what dang said? Hint: "I'm sure your language is fine" in no way implies that dang said "the language is fine".
      - msm_ 3y ago
        >Hint: "I'm sure your language is fine" in no way implies that dang said "the language is fine". This made me realise how trying to sound polite may completely obfuscate what you want to say.
    - ModernMech 3y ago
      This right here is why people have a problem with you and your language. You did make outrageous claims, and to now say you didn't is gaslighting. Accordingly, people do not trust you. Here's just one. On an early version of your webpage you said in big bold font: > V can translate your entire C/C++ project and offer you the safety, simplicity, and up to 200x compilation speed up. When people called you out, it turned into this small subscript: > C++ to V translation is at an early stage. And it's been in an "early stage" ever since. I'm sorry, but when you said "can translate your entire C/C++ project" did you mean "can" or did you mean "one day will be able to". Because those are completely different, and to say one when you mean the other is grossly misleading. To now say that you never said the former outrageous claim is gaslighting. We're not idiots or goldfish.
      - riku_iki 3y ago
        > To now say that you never said the former wondering if you have any link on where author said this (that he never said the former)?..
        deleted 3y ago
        [deleted]
        kaba0 3y ago
        https://web.archive.org/web/20190304161953/https://vlang.io// https://web.archive.org/web/20190304161953/https://vlang.io/... You can take a look at the progress of claims.
        riku_iki 3y ago
        my question was not about claims progression on website.
        ModernMech 3y ago
        I responded to the post where he said "There were no outrageous claims". "V can translate your entire C/C++ project" is an outrageous claim because it wasn't true then, it isn't true now, and it doesn't appear it will ever be true.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- Tozen 3y ago
  Developers are allowed to get or ask for contributions, donations, or sponsors. To add to the strangeness of how its being mischaracterized, was the apparent jealousy (back in 2019) over the amount of donations that other developers got. Then for certain ones to have got so upset at getting less, they started to bash and publicly ask people to give them their money instead. Somehow, it's OK for X to get money for their competing language, but it's "wrong" for Y to get money for their language.
  - oblio 3y ago
    I have no horse in this race (and you obviously do). There were a TON of red flags around V for at least 1 year after the initial announcement. Funding, exaggerated claims, etc. I wish V the best of luck but the start wasn't something that inspired confidence in neutral observers like me.
Tozen 3y ago
All open-source programming languages are allowed to get or ask for donations and have sponsors, not just the languages that one is a fan of. It's also ethically wrong to engage in falsely labeling or making false accusations, such as "scam" or "vaporware". Particularly, when the actual intent or agenda is that such persons are detractors or competitors from rival languages. Lastly, various financial supporters of the V language have even come on HN to tell and explain how proud they are of the language and the progress it has made. Despite detractors and competitors, V is still making fantastic progress, and that's great to see.
- lifthrasiir 3y ago
  > All open-source programming languages are allowed to get or ask for donations and have sponsors, [...] > Particularly, when the actual intent or agenda is that such persons are detractors or competitors from rival languages. V was not open-sourced when the accusation was made, and there were probably two or three people qualifying your description of "rivals" (even after assuming bad intents). Stop diluting the context. > Lastly, various financial supporters of the V language have even come on HN to tell and explain how proud they are of the language and the progress it has made. This is not different from how many investors to failed crowdfunding campaigns would behave before the actual failure. They will either acknolwedge risks (but few actually evaluate them) or "answer" every criticism with non sequiturs. It is not really their fault, but still useless as an evidence.
  - amedvednikov 3y ago
    > V was not open-sourced when the accusation was made V has been open source since its public release on June 22, 2019. On June 20, 2019 an early access build of the compiler was released.
    - lifthrasiir 3y ago
      The "early access" thing makes sense in closed-source projects but not much in F/OSS projects. Now I understand what you meant, but as I've said it was not technically open-sourced for two days and no one would be sure whether you are sincere or not. This confusion should have been temporary and could have been easily resolved, but your reaction arguably made things worse. For example back then I actually asked you about the exact generic compilation strategy [1], and your answer was unnecessarily aggressive and content-free. It turns out that my later guess (to which you never replied) was right, i.e. the initial V compiler maintained a partial C code template that can be patched. If you had actually answered as such, people would have less reasons to disbelieve you because you have demonstrated a necessary understanding. This was also why other language developers were particularly harsh to you at the beginning. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20231856 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20231856
lifthrasiir 3y ago
That particular word was used back when V was not yet really open-sourced and only the playground and prebuilt binary was available [1]. The author falsely stated (among others) that it was already open-sourced, and while I believe it was a simple misunderstanding the reaction was not really far-fetched back then. That specific claim was retracted once the compiler was properly open-sourced [2]. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20230351 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20230351 [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20251706 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20251706
- amedvednikov 3y ago
  The author never stated it was open sourced when the early access binaries were released. They were released 2 days before the source. It was just an early access thing.
  - lifthrasiir 3y ago
    It was never known to everybody else that the source code would be available 2 days later. I still remember my surprise [1] back then. I, among others to which you still seem to have bad feelings, now believe that you were indeed not malicious and just bad at public relations like many of us. But that is the hindsight and no one would know it at that time. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20231899 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20231899
    - amedvednikov 3y ago
      No, it was written that the source would be released in 2 days. There was also an announcement on Twitter. > I, among others to which you still seem to have bad feelings I don't know who you are, and I have no bad feelings towards you.
    - deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
  - richbell 3y ago
    > The author never stated it was open sourced when the early access binaries were released. You really ought to clarify that YOU are the author. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25512003 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25512003 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31061295 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31061295

oblio 3y ago

I actually forgot about that, what did they do? Ask for Patreon contributions?

kbknapp 3y ago
It was a combination between Patreon and Github Sponsors for solo the lead developer at the time making several thousand USD per month. Those campaigns are still ongoing AFAIK, but the contribution amounts are now private.
- amedvednikov 3y ago
  [flagged]
  - ta20230828 3y ago
    > To quote the HN mod: the language is fine, and there's no need in these flame wars Really? In trying to counter claims about V misrepresenting things, you ... misrepresent what dang said? Hint: "I'm sure your language is fine" in no way implies that dang said "the language is fine".
    - msm_ 3y ago
      >Hint: "I'm sure your language is fine" in no way implies that dang said "the language is fine". This made me realise how trying to sound polite may completely obfuscate what you want to say.
  - ModernMech 3y ago
    This right here is why people have a problem with you and your language. You did make outrageous claims, and to now say you didn't is gaslighting. Accordingly, people do not trust you. Here's just one. On an early version of your webpage you said in big bold font: > V can translate your entire C/C++ project and offer you the safety, simplicity, and up to 200x compilation speed up. When people called you out, it turned into this small subscript: > C++ to V translation is at an early stage. And it's been in an "early stage" ever since. I'm sorry, but when you said "can translate your entire C/C++ project" did you mean "can" or did you mean "one day will be able to". Because those are completely different, and to say one when you mean the other is grossly misleading. To now say that you never said the former outrageous claim is gaslighting. We're not idiots or goldfish.
    - riku_iki 3y ago
      > To now say that you never said the former wondering if you have any link on where author said this (that he never said the former)?..
      - deleted 3y ago
        [deleted]
      - kaba0 3y ago
        https://web.archive.org/web/20190304161953/https://vlang.io// https://web.archive.org/web/20190304161953/https://vlang.io/... You can take a look at the progress of claims.
        riku_iki 3y ago
        my question was not about claims progression on website.
      - ModernMech 3y ago
        I responded to the post where he said "There were no outrageous claims". "V can translate your entire C/C++ project" is an outrageous claim because it wasn't true then, it isn't true now, and it doesn't appear it will ever be true.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
Tozen 3y ago
Developers are allowed to get or ask for contributions, donations, or sponsors. To add to the strangeness of how its being mischaracterized, was the apparent jealousy (back in 2019) over the amount of donations that other developers got. Then for certain ones to have got so upset at getting less, they started to bash and publicly ask people to give them their money instead. Somehow, it's OK for X to get money for their competing language, but it's "wrong" for Y to get money for their language.
- oblio 3y ago
  I have no horse in this race (and you obviously do). There were a TON of red flags around V for at least 1 year after the initial announcement. Funding, exaggerated claims, etc. I wish V the best of luck but the start wasn't something that inspired confidence in neutral observers like me.

Tozen 3y ago

All open-source programming languages are allowed to get or ask for donations and have sponsors, not just the languages that one is a fan of. It's also ethically wrong to engage in falsely labeling or making false accusations, such as "scam" or "vaporware". Particularly, when the actual intent or agenda is that such persons are detractors or competitors from rival languages. Lastly, various financial supporters of the V language have even come on HN to tell and explain how proud they are of the language and the progress it has made. Despite detractors and competitors, V is still making fantastic progress, and that's great to see.

lifthrasiir 3y ago
> All open-source programming languages are allowed to get or ask for donations and have sponsors, [...] > Particularly, when the actual intent or agenda is that such persons are detractors or competitors from rival languages. V was not open-sourced when the accusation was made, and there were probably two or three people qualifying your description of "rivals" (even after assuming bad intents). Stop diluting the context. > Lastly, various financial supporters of the V language have even come on HN to tell and explain how proud they are of the language and the progress it has made. This is not different from how many investors to failed crowdfunding campaigns would behave before the actual failure. They will either acknolwedge risks (but few actually evaluate them) or "answer" every criticism with non sequiturs. It is not really their fault, but still useless as an evidence.
- amedvednikov 3y ago
  > V was not open-sourced when the accusation was made V has been open source since its public release on June 22, 2019. On June 20, 2019 an early access build of the compiler was released.
  - lifthrasiir 3y ago
    The "early access" thing makes sense in closed-source projects but not much in F/OSS projects. Now I understand what you meant, but as I've said it was not technically open-sourced for two days and no one would be sure whether you are sincere or not. This confusion should have been temporary and could have been easily resolved, but your reaction arguably made things worse. For example back then I actually asked you about the exact generic compilation strategy [1], and your answer was unnecessarily aggressive and content-free. It turns out that my later guess (to which you never replied) was right, i.e. the initial V compiler maintained a partial C code template that can be patched. If you had actually answered as such, people would have less reasons to disbelieve you because you have demonstrated a necessary understanding. This was also why other language developers were particularly harsh to you at the beginning. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20231856 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20231856

lifthrasiir 3y ago

That particular word was used back when V was not yet really open-sourced and only the playground and prebuilt binary was available [1]. The author falsely stated (among others) that it was already open-sourced, and while I believe it was a simple misunderstanding the reaction was not really far-fetched back then. That specific claim was retracted once the compiler was properly open-sourced [2]. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20230351 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20230351 [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20251706 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20251706

amedvednikov 3y ago
The author never stated it was open sourced when the early access binaries were released. They were released 2 days before the source. It was just an early access thing.
- lifthrasiir 3y ago
  It was never known to everybody else that the source code would be available 2 days later. I still remember my surprise [1] back then. I, among others to which you still seem to have bad feelings, now believe that you were indeed not malicious and just bad at public relations like many of us. But that is the hindsight and no one would know it at that time. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20231899 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20231899
  - amedvednikov 3y ago
    No, it was written that the source would be released in 2 days. There was also an announcement on Twitter. > I, among others to which you still seem to have bad feelings I don't know who you are, and I have no bad feelings towards you.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
- richbell 3y ago
  > The author never stated it was open sourced when the early access binaries were released. You really ought to clarify that YOU are the author. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25512003 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25512003 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31061295 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31061295