[python-advocacy] SD West

[Tennessee Leeuwenburg]

My 2c is that it's primarily a user-base issue. Python is a great language,
and I think that Python people love their language more than most people I
know. However, there are relatively few people who are able to work
full-time on marketing Python. By this I mean people whose Paid Job is to do
the website, write magazine articles, run conferences etc.

In Java, it's possible to make a career basically out of being a "guru" --
self-styling yourself, running a blog and a website, and promoting the
language, getting paid appearance money, advertising dollars and working as
a journalist.

Python, by contrast, isn't covered by any (Australian) bookstand magazines
that I know about, nor do we import any from the U.S. There aren't any
partnered magazines, no real major distribution channels for making Python
look sexy. It's gotten as far as it has on quality alone, but I don't know
if that's enough to get it to the 'next level' without first getting
populist groundswell in the way I've been talking about.

Certainly the community seems to be fragmented. It has been difficult
getting people to contribute to The Python Papers for example, when it
should have been easy...


... to be continued ...

Cheers,
-T
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