[Python-Dev] Re: Stability and change

[Alex Martelli]

On Monday 08 April 2002 19:52, Christopher Petrilli wrote:
	...
> In the end, I'd like to see something more concrete than speculation if
> we're going to change behavior.  

So would I -- but I have no budget for a market survey, so I can only
offer my modest personal experience.  I feel reasonably sure, about
quite a few development organizations I've been in touch with, that I
would have a _much_ better chance to convince them to try Python
in earnest if I could send the "stability and change" message.  A couple
of those organizations I know rather intimately (for one of them, I've
been Senior Software Consultant for 12+ years) and thus it's not just
an "I feel reasonably sure"... I *would* bet heavily that the change would
be very important in that case.

As to why you think such potential adopters, clearly so resistant to
change, would churn MORE than people who don't mind change, that
goes against common sense, so I think the burden of proof should be
on you in this case.  Why would a change-resistant user change back
more easily than a change-favourable user?  That's contradictory.


> I'm not opposed to a new model, I just
> want to understand what it gains in more concrete terms.  Speculation as
> to what the user wants gets you Microsoft Bob.

On the contrary: Microsoft has money to burn (particularly had it back
when Bob was being hatched), so the failure of that project, to me,
shows the modest value of market surveys (limited to the case of
products meant to be highly innovative -- it says nothing either pro
or con the value of such surveys when applied to very different issues
such as the one that involves us now, of course).


Alex