[maplant]

Personally it has never mattered to me how many people adopt Emacs because it has enough users to ensure development forever. I know for a fact that if the Emacs developers weren't doing a bang up job, which they are, then I would immediately allocate some of my time to help. Emacs is emblematic of the community aspect of software development that rms usually brings up when talking about free software, and I think it's a subtle notion that separates Emacs from a typical "open source" project. Projects that are as they say "Open Source" tend to be commercially oriented more than community oriented. Whether or not Emacs is a large or small community does not really matter to me, the software is pretty much stable enough that the future is bright even if everyone on the developer mailing list dropped dead.

I don't mean to complain about "open source" software nor do I claim that the way that Emacs is being developed is better than any other. What I mean to say is that Emacs is an old application and I found it on its old crusty website, decided to dedicate a bunch of time on learning macros, because that's simply the kind of person I am. Whether or not Emacs had a great website would not be the factor that swayed me, and frankly I'm not in the business of trying to sway people as an Emacs fan. Use what you want. I know I'm getting the best development environment for me, because I know me, and I've made Emacs mine.

[jpfr]

  I know for a fact that if the Emacs developers weren't
  doing a bang up job, which they are, then I would
  immediately allocate some of my time to help.

Development is going great IMHO. However, the bug count is steadily increasing. Any time invested into emacs is well spent.

https://lars.ingebrigtsen.no/2016/05/03/emacs-bug-trends/

[unhammer]

Same author also wrote a nice, short intro on how to get started with Emacs bug hunting: https://lars.ingebrigtsen.no/2014/11/13/welcome-new-emacs-de...

[digi_owl]

It may not be that they are commercially oriented, but that they have adopted startup-like mentalities regarding "growth".

This in turn leads to all kinds of changes to appear more fashionable and appealing to the masses.

Frankly i think thats a fools errand. Seems to me that when it comes to fashionable in relation to computing, we are dealing with a Giffen Good (or perhaps even a Veblen Good). Meaning that to be a fashionable computing platform, it has to be an expensive one.

But in the process you end up with something similar to New Public Management for FOSS projects. Trying to evangelize and drum up attention as if they were pitching a for profit product, much like NPM tries to put market forces into public services.

[rtpg]

I think this is a good lesson to people whose projects aren't Emacs' size yet.

Of course Emacs can get away with it, but this sets a good example of what a nice, simple website can look like for your project.

Don't spend too much time on the website, of course (the core project is what's important), but first impressions affect adoption, right?