[zmmmmm]

> have actually been harmed by the presence of features in the language

I am harmed routinely by too many features. I've been coding C++ for 11 years and I still end up scratching my head when I end up in foreign territory. Even his code at the end of the article which I think is supposed to be illustrating some kind of simplicity looks like a giant hairball of mess to me. I've ended up devolving to using a small subset of C++ features in my code which I know inside out and is sufficient for my needs. Others all seem to do the same but they arrive at a different subset. Java on the other hand seems to be so feature deprived and simplistic (minus generics, but they are almost an anti-feature) that no matter whose code I look at it is extremely obvious what is going on.