[potsandpans]

This kind of drama seems to exist very specifically to programming language design and implementation.

Probably has something to do with the codified formal structures necessary for various committees/ decision making groups.

But it's interesting. This kind of stuff happens in ECMA, Rust, Python and a few others. Go seems to have escaped. Maybe because it's a corporate owned Lang? Similarly no drama in the Typescript world.

[dumbo-octopus]

Corporate drama happens behind closed doors. It’s in the best interests of everyone at the company to present a unified vision, so that’s what happens.

Additionally, corporate structure is typically much more hierarchical. If someone has a complaint they can take it up with Anders, if he disagrees that’s it (unless your name happens to be Scott G or Satya N). This is, by and large, a good and efficient way to structure things.

[zellyn]

A prominent and influential Go developer was effectively banned for life from Go community forums some years back. I honestly don't remember enough of the details to have a clear opinion on whether it was ultimately warranted, but I still feel sad that it happened when I think about it from time to time. The fact that it's legitimately unwise to discuss and decide CoC violations in public can make the resulting disappearances relatively invisible.

[bgentry]

I actually just re-read that whole thread earlier this evening for unrelated reasons: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31508000

In short, the Go module proxy causes an excessive traffic volume on git VCS sources with frequent clones of unchanged repos. Regardless of whether or not the developer is/was always reasonable in how he discussed this, he was absolutely right about this being a hostile behavior from the official Go proxy that is the result of bad/insufficient engineering. The team's suggestions to simply stop refreshing his one domain were also not sufficient given that the problem clearly impacts all Go module VCS hosts.

The developer also appeared to be banned in a way that violated the Go CoC's own provisions around fair notice and a proper hearing, which is super disappointing to see.

[zellyn]

Oh man, was Drew banned from all Go spaces, or just from the issue tracker as he mentioned? He seems to draw ire, although whenever I actually read what he writes, he usually makes a lot of sense. I imagine there are examples of him being abrasive, but it usually seems like he values being thoughtful and kind.

I was actually thinking of someone else: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34311643

[015a]

To take a stab at my perception of why this is: Its the same reason why everyone and their mother has an opinion on note taking; programming language design is a topic that has a comparatively low skill floor to have an opinion on. Its difficult to have an opinion on how, I don't even know, drivers should communicate with each other in the linux kernel, see I can't even come up with a great example of the kinds of discussions they have because the skill floor is reasonably high. Its more common to hear "We gotta bring Rust to linux"; even more common still is "Rust is too complicated" "too verbose" "we should change X Y Z" whatever.

[stackghost]

>This kind of drama seems to exist very specifically to programming language design and implementation.

There's that saying about the inverse correlation between impact of the project/the stakes, and people being drama lords.

[marcus_holmes]

I saw this in the re-enactment scene in the UK in the 80's and 90's [0], where there were endless schisms and political dramas. The same is true of any "scene" where the consequences of drama are minor and the participants have the scene as a core part of their identity.

I would expect there to be a class of admin in here that do not actually contribute code but have created positions of authority over the project based on "community contribution" only. There's a particular type of person that does this and derives great satisfaction from it. I'm not going to criticise this - often the "community contribution" is real and beneficial - but I don't think it helps when the focus of the team managing the project moves away from the purely technical.

[0] I'm sure it still happens, but I no longer witness it.

[userbinator]

No drama in C that I can remember either, because there is not much of a "community" in the first place.

[alexey-salmin]

There's a community, just too busy with the actual programming.

[jart]

There's an online community for Cosmopolitan C on places like Discord. Everyone who's there, is there because I welcome them and want them to be there. The code of conduct is you have to behave like Mr. Rogers. There's no sexism, racism, name it. The C developers in our community don't even use swear words.

[EasyMark]

This drama exists in nearly every human committee in existence.

[throwawa14223]

My personal conspiracy theory is that it is the corporations demanding the codes of conduct as a form of sabotage for products that they can't control.