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by steveklabnik 2587 days ago
Everyone's experiences are different. Many languages don't even have a centralized web presence, and many don't have code snippets on the home page. Just as you'd absolutely expect it, I would equally never expect it.

You can see some code in less than fifteen seconds by clicking the big yellow "get started" button.

2 comments

I think your parent commenter gave you a very valuable marketing feedback and you should take it seriously and not deflect it with the diplomatic yet hollow "everyone's experiences are different".

Did you agree with their feedback? Disagree? State it plainly, no one is going to sue you for it. :)

Many people who frequent HN are quite busy professionals. I too quickly close web pages that show zero code, or motivation for creating the language, or brief install instructions. To me it means that the creators can't present well and that leads me to assume that their programming language is bad at expressing intent as well (and thus verbose or confusing). Is this a wrong assumption? Very likely, but the first 10-30 seconds of percepting something new are not rational. That's a widely accepted psychological premise in marketing.

You might disagree and that's okay. Marketing however isn't at all about what you like but what your average site visitor likes.

So, finally, what was wrong with the code samples? They might have been too simple to be useful but they still did send the right signal to your busy programmer visitor -- IMO.

Feedback is valuable, and I did take it seriously. It's not new feedback.

> Marketing however isn't at all about what you like but what your average site visitor likes.

I agree 100%. But anecdotes, mine, yours or anyone else's, aren't data.

Ohh that’s where it is. That page with install instructions and examples is perfect.

I wasn’t looking to “Get Started” but why I might want to use it. Install instructions plus a basic example is all 90% of people want from a programming website.