"And I think in that it succeeded."

No need for speculation. Go ahead and say it: 124 points on HN's front page objectively proves it was successful in being interesting [to more than a handful of people]. Exploration into minimalist languages sometimes leads to interesting, practical constructions as well like seen with LISP's, Forth, and Lambda Calculus. Far as time wasters go, such experimentation has a higher chance of going somewhere than some others.