> I may be curt, strident, and critical, but you don't really have high ground when it comes to condescension. You went straight to childish insults. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6679901

Not me. Try again.

Define "substantial". I've seen some complaints here that AngularDart has, and will, take away from AngularJS, which, again, is unsubstantiated. It's counter to the evidence and the likelihood that the groups working together will make both better.

> I'm not arguing for Dart's existence here, I'm saying Dart has absolutely no chance of securing the browser's runtime over javascript.

Uh, you've expressed "cynicism [...] over Google's waste of time" and called Dart "pretty flawed", which you haven't substantiated yet. If your were merely expressing skepticism over Dart "securing the browser's runtime over javascript", there wouldn't be a discussion here. Brendan Eich did that for you a long time ago. I'd contend that it doesn't really matter as long as dart2js can fulfill its goals; however, I'd still maintain a wait-and-see attitude about how we'll see DartVM used. There are some very interesting possibilities.

> 173KB. This is ridiculous.

Substance! Thank you. Dart is pre-1.0. It's being worked on. Also, notice at the bottom of that page:

  We want your help, especially if you can make update
  @MirrorsUsed in main.dart to generate a smaller binary.

No, I won't. The attitude isn't conducive to civil discourse and not welcome here so I'll continue calling it out where I see it. I'll take the upvotes as confirmation that others agree with me.

You've got your unsubstantiated opinions and will continue making these "sweeping" claims so there's no point in continuing here. It leaves little room for meaningful discussion, unfortunately.

> Do you think Dart is that amazing? Do you think Dart is just so wonderful that it'll unite the programming world as never before?

The world isn't black and white. Dart doesn't have to be perfect to be a viable alternative to JS.

> Even Google's pet framework is divided and recoiling.

No, they both thrive and benefit from the other. It is a feature. The same thing is happening with Polymer.

> Why Dart?

Take a cursory look and you'll find some arguments for Dart but I would think you would have covered this before having such a strong opinion.

> Google is trying to shove Dart down our throats

Said multiple times. Substantiate please.

> fall off the radar when it's clear that it doesn't transpile to js very well. The alternative is a fantasy.

So you know more about dart2js capabilities than the creators of V8 and Dart? This is the condescending and arrogant attitude I spoke of.

https://www.dartlang.org/performance/

In all of your condescending[1] comments, you have forgotten to actually articulate what your reasoning is. These are as close as you got:

  Dart doesn't have the open, cheerful intentions

  Google's overbearing intention is obvious

  flawed language

  this one is doomed to fail

  forced down our throat

I don't think it was obvious. It may be true but they were uncontroversial comments on a controversial topic. The language and DartVM aren't ready for Chrome, right now. You'd hear the same from the Dart team.

> we don't need a language to replace javascript

Absolutely... in the same way we didn't need Python, Ruby, C++, Java, Clojure, Haskell, etc. In fact, I'd say we needed those less considering the enormous choice on non-web platforms.

(Edit: I see ljoshua beat me to the possibility for issues here but it's important to emphasize that it can be done, just play by the rules to avoid trouble down the line.)

But that's true of any service from any company. If I'm a stay-at-home mom making some extra cash on Helpouts, I have a very different risk profile than a doctor who closes down his practice to see patients exclusively through Helpouts. The stay-at-home mom might not be happy about a shutdown but she still "[netted] a lot of money" whereas the doctor might have destroyed his/her career. Every individual/company needs to assess their own risk and take the appropriate risk-mitigating actions.

The point I'm making is that the damages from a Google service shutdown are typically very low or easily mitigated (Google Checkout being no exception) and every service should be evaluated on an individual basis with your risk profile. If the value you are getting from any service is lower than the damages that would result from a shutdown, don't put all of your eggs in that basket; if you do anyway, get some contractual guarantees and be confident that they will be fulfilled.

I doubt it. That attitude is mostly a HN/geek thing. I like that they're willing to try things and test for viability in the real world. I'd rather have something and for it go away than to never have it at all. (And yes, I do understand the frustrations with Reader but I wouldn't go back in time and never use it from the start)

[1] https://stripe.com/docs/api

A single incident sets the upper limit? We don't know what kind of example he sets on a day-to-day basis. Customer service is a mentally taxing job. If I'm the person on the front line, I'm thinking, "at least the boss understands and has my back" rather than feeling defeated. Some customers are just bad customers; sure, try to understand and sympathize but there comes a point to tell them to "fuck off" (in the appropriate customer-service language).

The only thing wrong here is that it leaked out to the customer.

This hits many people after just talking about their goals. They get the same good feelings of achievement that lead to de-motivation to follow through with it.

If you had done that, I'd have no issue with a civil critique of the content but to dismiss ("fail", really?), insult ("spam") and patronize ("Hire a real writer[...]") the project of a respected member of the community (or anyone) to the extend that you did, with no basis (you haven't read the book and don't seem to have read the table of contents), has no place here or anywhere intelligent discussion is desired.

It's clear this is an evolving project. I don't believe Derek Sivers would do a project like you making it out to be and I don't think you have any basis to think he is, even if you don't know who he is.

Just to quickly address some things where you've missed the point: these are entrepreneurs' guides; these are targeted at an American and other non-Asian markets so it's important to answer questions from that perspective, regardless if you think they're irrelevant (you can't know what's irrelevant until someone tells you or you learn from experience); it's amusing that the "contents are a joke" when they address the things you have asked for.

And from above:

> Come on... this is lowly. Just because you have some money to spam-market quick-e-books with doesn't mean you are the arbiter of truth. Hire a real writer, do some real research, and be honest about it. Without quality, there is little point in publishing. Fail.

Go look at the content before before making such claims ("lowly...spam...without quality") and advising them on their methods. After you've done that, how about focusing on the content?

Sorry for the tone but I can't stand these types of off-base dismissals and ending it with "fail" is just the icing on the cake. Derek Sivers is a respected member of the community that just spent the last nearly two years of his life on this and deserves better than these as the top comments on his announcement.

No it was genuine. I don't think you lied at all and I apologized for it.

> but are tying to suggest that I'm a liar anyway with the ambiguous phrase "it still seems the behavior fits".

Re-read my original comment. The behavior I'm talking about is what is above the edit, not lying, but I can see how you would have that mistaken interpretation. I'm not having my best day with communication.

> You know other people can see your comments, right? Not just me?

Yes, I'm quite aware.

I'm sorry. I honestly missed that. That was meant as evidence to support that you were in fact doing what i was describing. I mistakenly accused you of lying but it still seems the behavior fits (EDIT: not lying rather the behavior in the first paragraph of my original comment).

---

[Ignore below. I misread the comments but I'm leaving for context. I think the above comment stands without the evidence below.]

Quoting from above:

  some girl I never heard of

  I hear about her all the time

It's a hypothetical not a question of the present state of things but either way, I disagree. Rachel's comment [1] (I understand it wasn't present when I made my first comment), while terse, is more interesting, more likely to foster interesting discussion and doesn't have the dreaded HN "middlebrow dismissal". And I have no doubt HN can come up with much, much better. The point being, it became a "magnet for upvotes" and nothing better ever had a chance to reach the top to encourage more interesting discussion.

> but a site that included ebay and intuit under the banner of "startups", yes, this might be the most interesting point of the site people want to discuss.

That's unfortunate; I've found HN to be a place to find great tangentially related discussion to otherwise uninteresting posts. That doesn't happen by accident; we need to foster it.

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5736869