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> You should ponder why Erlang or Haskell achieved a fraction of Go's adoption despite being on the market 20+ years longer. This line of thinking serves more

> You should ponder why Erlang or Haskell achieved a fraction of Go's adoption despite being on the market 20+ years longer. This line of thinking serves more to call in to question the engineering and management cultures we have than it does to reflect poorly on Haskell and Erlang, and if it's true that Go's essential strength compared to them is that it is well-fitted to these cultures, that's not particularly flattering, however locally practical it may be.

jshen 12y ago
If languages like Haskell and Erlang gave a competitive advantage, wouldn't we see companies which used them succeeding over those that don't? Maybe Go is fitting into the cultures that succeed, and if that's the case, well it's the better choice, right?
- lmm 12y ago
  > If languages like Haskell and Erlang gave a competitive advantage, wouldn't we see companies which used them succeeding over those that don't? We are. WhatsApp generated a flurry of interest around Erlang. Heroku uses it. I'm sure there are more examples. Google is at this point already a large corporation and probably already in decline (IMO). The tools they use are optimized for interchangeability of mediocre programmers, not for high productivity from a small team. Go is a perfectly good Java 1.4. (There's Docker using Go, but I think their whole approach is a bad idea).
  - deleted 12y ago
    [deleted]
  - jshen 12y ago
    You are seeing companies that use those languages suceeding at a higher rate than those that don't? I bet I can find 10 succeeding that use ruby or node for everyone that uses Erlang. We could also look at the open source world. For every riak there are 10 java sucesses of a similar kind. We'd need to do some real statistics but my bet is that we see no benefit from those languages in terms of success of the business.
    - lmm 12y ago
      > I bet I can find 10 succeeding that use ruby or node for everyone that uses Erlang. But that's not the question, is it? There are a lot of companies succeeding with ruby or node, but also a lot of companies failing with them. I'll bet the strike rate is better for Erlang companies.
      - jshen 12y ago
        Il bet that the choice of language has no impact on success.
        codygman 12y ago
        What about whitespace? Do you think choosing it or brainfuck has an impact on success?
        jshen 12y ago
        Not relevant. I'm sure there are bad choices, but the difference between Go and Haskell is probably negligible or in Go's favor.
        lmm 12y ago
        So you think Go is a better language because companies that use Go are more likely to be successful because... Go is a better language? That's just circular reasoning. Do you have any numbers or experience here? (In my limited experience I've seen a 100% success rate for companies that use Haskell and a 0% success rate for companies that use Go, though as you can imagine I don't have a statistically valid sample size)
        jshen 12y ago
        Right, there is no good data at all suggesting that languages like Haskell are better for teams. Yet we are constantly served peoples overly confident opinions that they are.
- pjmlp 12y ago
  > If languages like Haskell and Erlang gave a competitive advantage, wouldn't we see companies which used them succeeding over those that don't? Like these? https://www.haskell.org/haskellwiki/Haskell_in_industry https://www.haskell.org/haskellwiki/Haskell_in_industry https://www.erlang-solutions.com/industries https://www.erlang-solutions.com/industries https://ocaml.org/learn/companies.html https://ocaml.org/learn/companies.html http://fsharp.org/testimonials/ http://fsharp.org/testimonials/
  - codygman 12y ago
    The stock price of Standard Chartered is 939 GBX currently.
AnimalMuppet 12y ago
That sounds almost like denial to me. "If everybody doesn't adopt what I think they should, it has to be because they're dysfunctional! It can't be because the stuff I like is less generally applicable than I think it is!" If people disagree with you, your default assumption should be that they are looking at different evidence than you, not that they are incompetent or stupid.

jshen 12y ago

If languages like Haskell and Erlang gave a competitive advantage, wouldn't we see companies which used them succeeding over those that don't? Maybe Go is fitting into the cultures that succeed, and if that's the case, well it's the better choice, right?

lmm 12y ago
> If languages like Haskell and Erlang gave a competitive advantage, wouldn't we see companies which used them succeeding over those that don't? We are. WhatsApp generated a flurry of interest around Erlang. Heroku uses it. I'm sure there are more examples. Google is at this point already a large corporation and probably already in decline (IMO). The tools they use are optimized for interchangeability of mediocre programmers, not for high productivity from a small team. Go is a perfectly good Java 1.4. (There's Docker using Go, but I think their whole approach is a bad idea).
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
- jshen 12y ago
  You are seeing companies that use those languages suceeding at a higher rate than those that don't? I bet I can find 10 succeeding that use ruby or node for everyone that uses Erlang. We could also look at the open source world. For every riak there are 10 java sucesses of a similar kind. We'd need to do some real statistics but my bet is that we see no benefit from those languages in terms of success of the business.
  - lmm 12y ago
    > I bet I can find 10 succeeding that use ruby or node for everyone that uses Erlang. But that's not the question, is it? There are a lot of companies succeeding with ruby or node, but also a lot of companies failing with them. I'll bet the strike rate is better for Erlang companies.
    - jshen 12y ago
      Il bet that the choice of language has no impact on success.
      - codygman 12y ago
        What about whitespace? Do you think choosing it or brainfuck has an impact on success?
        jshen 12y ago
        Not relevant. I'm sure there are bad choices, but the difference between Go and Haskell is probably negligible or in Go's favor.
        lmm 12y ago
        So you think Go is a better language because companies that use Go are more likely to be successful because... Go is a better language? That's just circular reasoning. Do you have any numbers or experience here? (In my limited experience I've seen a 100% success rate for companies that use Haskell and a 0% success rate for companies that use Go, though as you can imagine I don't have a statistically valid sample size)
        jshen 12y ago
        Right, there is no good data at all suggesting that languages like Haskell are better for teams. Yet we are constantly served peoples overly confident opinions that they are.
pjmlp 12y ago
> If languages like Haskell and Erlang gave a competitive advantage, wouldn't we see companies which used them succeeding over those that don't? Like these? https://www.haskell.org/haskellwiki/Haskell_in_industry https://www.haskell.org/haskellwiki/Haskell_in_industry https://www.erlang-solutions.com/industries https://www.erlang-solutions.com/industries https://ocaml.org/learn/companies.html https://ocaml.org/learn/companies.html http://fsharp.org/testimonials/ http://fsharp.org/testimonials/
- codygman 12y ago
  The stock price of Standard Chartered is 939 GBX currently.

AnimalMuppet 12y ago

That sounds almost like denial to me. "If everybody doesn't adopt what I think they should, it has to be because they're dysfunctional! It can't be because the stuff I like is less generally applicable than I think it is!" If people disagree with you, your default assumption should be that they are looking at different evidence than you, not that they are incompetent or stupid.