From: Chad Perrin <perrin@...>
Date: 2006-08-17T19:03:04+09:00
Subject: Re: Ruby is exploding onto the scene as Java did at the end of 1990s

On Thu, Aug 17, 2006 at 06:35:04PM +0900, Huw Collingbourne wrote:
> 
> I remember the hype very well. I was covering the 'Java phenomenon' at 
> Comdex in Las Vegas that year. We would, it seemed, all be using Java 'thin 
> clients' instead of PCs and Windows would be a thing of the past within a 
> year or two. I've seen some hype in my time but nothing to compare with 
> Java. The plain truth is that while Java has been *quite* successful, it has 
> yet to come anywhere close to its own hype.

It may well be that the absurd level of hype was intentionally well out
of proportion with any realistic expectation of the future of the
technology: when there is hype (which is what all marketing aims to be),
reality will fall short.  That's an almost indisputable truism.  The
more hype you can create, however, the more that will get done in that
direction (at least in the short term).  If you claim that Java will
replace even operating systems and hardware to a nontrivial degree,
you're far more likely to end up with Java replacing other programming
languages in a lot of cases where it really shouldn't, again to a
nontrivial degree.  Thus, by creating absurd, effectively impossible
levels of hype, Sun and friends managed to ensure that Java achieved
absurd, highly improbable levels of success, where "success" is defined
as market share and mindshare.

Thus, for several years, the number of Java jobs, books, and classes
outnumbered the number of jobs, books, and classes for all other
languages in at least most mainstream contexts.

-- 
CCD CopyWrite Chad Perrin [ http://ccd.apotheon.org ]
"The ability to quote is a serviceable
substitute for wit." - W. Somerset Maugham