Fat and happy Pythonistas (was Re: Replacement for keyword 'global' good idea? ...)

[Peter Hansen]

John Roth wrote:
> It's not going to happen because the Python community is fat and happy,
> and is not seeing the competition moving up on the outside. Characteristics
> that make a great language one day make a mediocre one a few years
> later, and make a has-been a few years after that.

And here I thought that was the point of Python 3000.  To let the 
community produce a much improved language while avoiding the problems 
caused by too much change occurring while people are trying to get 
useful things done with what the language is _now_.  The competition 
(and let's see a description of just what that means, too) probably has 
the dual advantage of newness and a small, hackerish community that is 
more than happy to see rapid and radical change.  You're right -- as 
with the stereotypical large/slow vs. small/agile company motif -- that 
smaller and more agile will pass larger and slow "on the outside", but 
you're wrong if you think that means the larger-slower entity should 
drop what it's been doing so well and try to compete entirely on the 
smaller-faster entity's own ground.

BTW, I think "large and stable" would have been less offensive than "fat 
and happy", but perhaps you meant to imply we're both lazy and 
complacent, rather than just satisfied with something that works and not 
inclined to shoot for moving targets every working day.  If so, I'm not 
sure why you'd say that, since the evidence doesn't support it.


-Peter