Who is www.python.org for? (was Re: New Python.org website ?)

[Roy Smith]

Terry Hancock <hancock at anansispaceworks.com> wrote:
> For all the commercial value in Python (and there is plenty,
> I am sure), it's not Java, and I don't want it to be.  I'm
> cool with suits loving it too, but I don't want to have to
> put on a suit to play. Python is an absolutely top-notch
> free software language for free software developers, not
> least of which are the amateurs, who program for love, not
> money.

I didn't have anything to do with this prototype (in fact, I didn't even 
know it was being built until it was announced here recently), but I was 
involved with some of the early discussions 3-4 years back about how to 
promote Python within the corporate world.

For the most part, I agree with Terry; I want a site that gives me the info 
I need without any fluff getting in the way.  But, at the same time, I 
realize that there is a need for marketing to suits.

I've been working with Python for something like 8 years (and, depending on 
how you count, 3 or 4 employers).  I've seen how difficult it is to get it 
adopted in the corporate world.  Like it or not, suits run the business 
world, and they make the business decisions.  It's one thing for me to 
decide to write something in Python, but to actually get something 
integrated into the build system, get the QA guys on board, get legal to 
endorse its use, etc, involves getting a lot of suits involved.  That's 
life in the corporate world.

I may think Java sucks, and you may think Java sucks, but like it or not, 
it's accepted in the corporate world.  If you want to get paid to write 
Python code, it's in your best interests to get Python accepted by the 
suits the same way Java is now.  If that means www.python.org looks like 
something that came out of a corporate PR department, that's a pretty small 
price to pay.






> 
> I hesitate to express this opinion, because I don't want to
> seem intolerant (and I'm going to use whatever site there
> is), but if the suits can get their own place and leave me
> alone, I'm for that. ;-)
> 
> For me, the most important function of the python.org site
> is as a quick-reference to deeper documentation that I
> actually need in the process of writing Python code.
> 
> I don't really know if I'm the "market" for this site. I'm
> already sold on Python, after all, I just want something
> useful that I can use to stay up-to-date, and to find other
> Python resources if they move, get created, or if I just
> lose track of the URLs.