[Argorak]

I beg to differ. Github pushes its code rendering as far as possible, including providing widgets to embed code snippets into you blog. It is also the _main content they display all the time_. That's not "non-essential".

Just switching the library and breaking things at a whim is problematic.

Also, the number of languages may be 316 (including some oddballs like "Unified Parallel C") but that's still a possible number to check for at least for major, obvious breakages. Still, for people that do use Unified Parallel C, adequate highlighting might just be the reason to choose that platform and use it to write your blog in, instead of writing a custom highlighter for prism.js.

Sorry, if you business is code and you decide to support 316 languages, expect people to hold you on that promise.

That said, also: errors happen. But that isn't a reason to give them a pass, just not to put too much weight on such things. It doesn't break the platform at large, but terribly inconveniences some users, and they are very right in being upset, too.

[tomcorrigan]

> expect people to hold you on that promise

What promise did github make?

[Argorak]

The promise any service makes. To solve my problems and to work _as a service_ for me.

[resetti]

That's neither how promises nor the laws around them work. GitHub owes you nothing except what was explicitly spelled out when you signed up.

Half the difficulty of running a business comes from customers with a sense of entitlement not understanding this.

[Argorak]

The other half being providing a service they find worthwhile that doesn't change at every whim.

Taken to the other extreme, a constantly breaking Github doesn't have any value proposition.

Promises are not always explicit and not at all related to laws.

The next Transformers being something to look forward to is a promise, but that doesn't mean not liking it is in any way wrong or that I could sue someone for it. I can choose to leave the movie and never go see one again. The producers of Transformers certainly owe me nothing, but they also cannot tell me how to feel about their handling of the material.

Github promises the most awesome code hosting around. That's a very different thing for many people. And to some people you can live up to the promise, to some people you cannot and it's perfectly fine for those to feel let down. Calling all those people "entitled" is, quite frankly, insulting.

As I said: putting this like it is the end of the world is overreaching, but it is a valid complaint and a valid sentiment. Saying that this is the most important thing on Github, because it happens to be specific your problem is entitlement.

Finally, it isn't true that you are only bound by spelled out things. The law many people cite so often has the concept of Good Faith: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Good_faith_%28law%29 and similar fun things that extend beyond that. So Github _does_ owe me beyond their ToS. (I appreciate that this is probably not a case covered by this)

It's a common sentiment in these circles that only the rules written on the contract are the ones that count, while nothing can be further from the truth, widely varying from legislation to legislation.

[scott_s]

Agreed. A business relationship is more like personal relationships than I think some technical people think. Pointing at the contract is a failure condition.

[rofl1234]

nobody's talking about legal contracts. the issue is of good will. the promise github has made is they would provide all kinds of hosting (git, gitsts, pages, whatnot). people move from other solutions to github because the github's promise (again, not a legal contract) is "we're better".

the other half the difficulty of running a business comes from making tacit promises and then acting annoyed that the other side holds you to them.

[darkarmani]

> Half the difficulty of running a business comes from customers with a sense of entitlement not understanding this.

I'm not sure you understand the network effect and how that ties into Github's business.