Tozen

Dang, I'm confused in how it appears V is regarded very differently from other languages and possible desire to completely censor it. I'm, however, highly sympathetic to moderation efforts at HN (for higher quality debates and opinions).

> I'm sure V is a very nice language but HN doesn't need to have threads about it

It looks to be giving the impression (maybe unintentionally) that threads about V are unwanted on HN. Where it's fine to have threads about other languages, despite them clearly having issues, controversy, or need of moderation as well.

All threads about V or posts initiated in a thread which concerns V, are not posted by "V's people" and definitely not by me. For that matter, I'm completely independent, despite what might be the perception. I have no relation nor any connection to who created this thread, or many others about V. I just was commenting on a topic that I saw on HN and expressing opinions.

> which incidentally was kickstarted by someone on your side, not the other side...

I have zero ideal who manofmanysmiles or modinfo are (both accounts existing years before mine), nor am I on their side or rather it's unfair to categorize us as being on the same side.

That someone posts something that contains a bit of support or is positive about V, can be completely unrelated to them being teamed up or in collusion, but just coincidental opinions or observations.

In fact, it appears manofmanysmiles is not a user of the language, but an outsider asking for opinions. Which then people posted their opinions in response, as would be expected for just about any topic or that kind of post.

> would be for those of you who feel aggrieved by unfair criticism to stop being provoked...

Would this not be true for both sides, not the side that is perceived as being supportive of V?

I thought the point of HN was to allow and respectfully give different opinions about a topic, not to censor a particular side or topic.

This definition could be interpreted that the positive side be removed. And purposefully allow damaging or negative information to be unchallenged and spread by default.

> critics will never go away

Totally agree, as this is the nature of human discussion.

> But it means developing the capacity not to be so easily provoked, which (I know well from my own experience) is not so easy.

If the meaning is to "grow a thicker skin" in response to criticism, on that we agree. A higher quality of respectful and informative discussion should be aspired to and engaged in, as part of maintaining the desired standard of HN. And would be why many, like myself, have enjoyed or have come here to see.

In the link you posted (id=36816398), never saw it until this, as the entire series of posts were deleted away from the main thread. So was not aware of the situation, and that it was being blamed on me specifically.

If you review those chain of posts, surely the account that first named V directly (not to even go into the list of many other antagonists), initiated and provoked by specifically targeting the V language. Including posting provocative or inflammatory links (which are spammed on most V threads).

I'm concerned that the definition of what constitutes instigating or being found at fault for starting a flamewar, appears directed at those who may respond with or show any support for V.

Those that are clearly instigating, continually snarky, or even directly insulting in their posts seem to go unpunished or ignored. Though, as a user, don't have the greater perspective on this.

Apologies on the rule violation, as often attempt to avoid crossing the line, and was just attempting to provide at least a contrasting point of view to what is continually taking place on the subject. After review, do see which rule was violated, which was not the original intent.

If you would be kind of enough to, can you instruct on how you view this situation?

V has the right to exist, have its supporters, and do things its own way. The creator and developers of V, from what I have seen, have responded well to actual constructive criticism. Their language has discussions opened at their GitHub, unlike those for various other languages. They even have a thread for what people don't like and want improved about the language[1], again, something many other languages don't have.

A lot of what was going on initially, was coming from obvious competitors and evangelists, to include being uncivil, inflammatory, and directly insulting. The initial "criticism" was not so much that, but false accusations of the language being a scam, vaporware, fraud, or didn't really exist. To include attacks and jealousy over donations, rising popularity, and having supporters. This was not any kind of "valid" criticism, that the creator or contributors of the language could reason about with instigators.

The "criticism" never died down, but rather V was open-sourced and established itself on GitHub. The initial series of false accusations could not stand nor could the support it was getting be stopped. So, the rhetoric and targets shifted to whatever could be found to go after on the newly released alpha version of the language and its new website. In that new mix of what was being thrown at it, there were indeed some very valid criticisms, as can be found with any new language and many sites.

Constructive and valid criticism, is not the same as insults, trolling, misinformation, rivalry, or false accusations. There is clearly a difference. It's disingenuous to pretend something from one group is the same as the other, or that the intent behind what is being done is not different.

[1] https://github.com/vlang/v/discussions/7610

What you want to use or avoid, is not necessarily what others want or avoid, and we should respect each others different preferences.

V is not a finished product nor 1.0 yet. It's unproductive to act like things were carved in stone, from day 1. Programming languages go through development phases, where things do change and lead developers are allowed to make changes.

Think it's way more about detractors trying to push a negative narrative on the language, than it's any kind of reflection of the community, who are elsewhere.

> should be ignored until it dies into obscurity

That is your interpretation of what is being said, where "prove to be something viable" is being added, and graciously giving the benefit of the doubt to the person who wrote the statement.

I took it, as possibly many others, as "ignore V until it dies". Thus, "V should die", would also be near enough to the intent, malice, and vitriol be conveyed. If someone said something similar to me or about something I created, "Ignore X until it dies", would not interpret it as anything other than ill intent.

In both the review itself and in V's documentation, from which the example came, it states that autofree is still WIP. It's arguably disingenuous to pretend otherwise or present unintended usage.

The normal "day-to-day" situation would be to have the GC on or as fallback, and to do otherwise (like -gc none or -prealloc), one should know what they are doing or be prepared to deal with such issues.

Those parts of the review, considered relevant in normal usage were resolved:

https://github.com/vlang/v/issues/14803

https://github.com/vlang/v/issues/14787

https://github.com/vlang/v/issues/14786

But even beyond that, the intent of the so-called review was arguably malevolent. It was not done in good faith, to be helpful to the developers or community, but done to spur on drama (thus adding the vaporware link and spamming it) and knowingly looking for ways to bash an alpha version of the language.

On June 20th of 2019, and prior to the open-source release of V on June 22nd of 2019, the creators of competing languages, and various supporters of theirs made very disparaging remarks against V and it's creator[1].

V was falsely characterized and accused of being a "scam", "vaporware", or "fraud" that really didn't exist or its source would not be released to the public. To include, V's creator was allowed to be heavily and repeatedly insulted on the thread.

The creator of one of the languages made a direct plea to not give money to the V project, and instead give that money to himself and another creator[1]. Which, was way beyond the usual lines of civility. This was later added to, with the other creator (back in 2019) making a somewhat similar plea for people to give him their money instead while doing harsh attacks on V, from his website[2].

Surrounding that, was angry talk over how much monetary support V was getting[1]. "He's up to 56% of the income I make on Patreon..., and I've been busting my ass for years..."[1]. This can be viewed as jealousy over the amount another developer was getting, so early on.

Such behavior by language creators, against another, is clearly and extremely irregular. While both creators later on kind of walked backed their earlier statements and attempted to remove themselves from heightened drama and initiating a language war, it was arguably way too late. The statements were walked back a bit, because they were in error. V's creator made an early release for his Patreon supporters, which he has the right to, that was taken out of context. Furthermore, he did release the source for V, 2 days later and in June (as was promised). Despite this, the goal posts were moved, to continually find anything else to attack V on (from when it was an alpha) as a newer competing language.

Over the years, the drama has persisted. To include HN accounts dedicated for the purpose of attacking or insulting V (to include sleeper or newly created accounts), in the frame of an overall wider effort spanning years and various different websites. From time to time, the opposition against V, has also mistakenly or nonchalantly identified themselves as such (can be seen through search). Casual readers on HN or other websites, often don't know of the motives behind unnecessary or odd vitriol, so this can be "hidden" to them.

Lastly, the V language has every right to exist and flourish, as those other languages. V has numerous developers, contributors, and supporters who make it continually better.

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20229632

[2] https://andrewkelley.me/post/why-donating-to-musl-libc-proje...

Developers are allowed to get or ask for contributions, donations, or sponsors.

To add to the strangeness of how its being mischaracterized, was the apparent jealousy (back in 2019) over the amount of donations that other developers got. Then for certain ones to have got so upset at getting less, they started to bash and publicly ask people to give them their money instead.

Somehow, it's OK for X to get money for their competing language, but it's "wrong" for Y to get money for their language.

It can be done. There is already a specific module/project for the purpose, called VAB[1].

[1]https://github.com/vlang/vab#readme

V was never a "scam" or "vaporware", that's a false characterization and misuse of the terms. Such is being done for the purpose of attempting to hurt the public image of competition, for the benefit of certain parties.

V has been open-sourced, on GitHub, and downloadable since June 22nd of 2019. The language creator publicly stated he would put it out in late June, and did.

There was some excessive fuss about, around June of 2019, over a Patreon supporter early release. That was his right to do such a release, and it was specific for those supporters, but detractors were "angry" that it wasn't for them or open-sourced.

What some detractors were trying to do, was claim that V would never be released because it was somehow a "scam" or "vaporware". That is, there was nothing to release. They were of course wrong, because V was publicly released. That's when targets were switched or the goal posts moved. Anything that could be used to attempt to justify the earlier vitriol, inhibit the rising popularity, or hurt the public image of the language was used.

Furthermore, no programming language is released as a finished product. And an alpha version of any language, is understood by most, as work in progress (WIP) by default. There is no "scam" there. For open-source projects, any person is free to contribute, if they are really so technically knowledgeable as they claim or give the appearance of being. Everyone is free to donate or sponsor a project that they like, there's nothing nefarious about that.

A lot of the false accusations, spamming of negative links, and misinformation arguably comes from those with competing or hidden interests. It's a lot of language war antics, that got out of control.

Various competing languages use reddit as a forum, because their language didn't previously have one or their developers didn't open up discussions on GitHub. Evangelists of competing languages can be allowed to bash, flame, or troll opposing languages on various subreddits.

If they outnumber a rival language, in a place they often congregate and the mods will allow such behavior, then they can get away with typing the most outrageous or foul statements for points. It came become a bash and troll festival, and anyone that dares oppose, can get intentionally downvoted away or punished by their mods who have control.

People that are casuals or don't know what's going on behind the scenes, may see only their side. There is often no balanced discussion. Any opposing view points to the false accusations, extreme negative positions, misinformation, or wrong statements may not be allowed to be seen.

All open-source programming languages are allowed to get or ask for donations and have sponsors, not just the languages that one is a fan of.

It's also ethically wrong to engage in falsely labeling or making false accusations, such as "scam" or "vaporware". Particularly, when the actual intent or agenda is that such persons are detractors or competitors from rival languages.

Lastly, various financial supporters of the V language have even come on HN to tell and explain how proud they are of the language and the progress it has made. Despite detractors and competitors, V is still making fantastic progress, and that's great to see.

> Why?

Not understanding the need to be dismissive of someone else's plans. Part of the fun of programming is checking things out, if we maintain an open-mind.

> this language has literally no unique attributes that would make it different than D or Go, so you won’t improve as a developer from it at all...

Such a statement can be perceived as highly inflammatory. V clearly has different features from D and Go. Additionally, V is among the most popular programming languages on GitHub[1], based on stars. And has been so for some years now. Other people clearly use and experiment with it. What you and I like, doesn't mean that others don't or can't have different preferences.

[1] https://ossinsight.io/collections/programming-language/

> by the way they are pushing development of so many products...

"They" are many different people (developers or contributors). As an open-source project, people focus on what they like or may need.

Furthermore, V has a native backend, in addition to others: C, JavaScript, WASM, etc... They've stated (on their website) that their plan is to eventually make the native backend the primary, as they close in on 1.0. The other backends can be seen, for those that have actually used or know of the language, by checking out the -b flag.

But are they compensated or are we dealing with disguised wage theft[1]? A lot of times, when it's time to pay all that overtime or when someone finally speaks up about it, suddenly the "fun" stops.

Then there is the not speaking out, resulting in: 1) Burn out and quit. 2) Company dumps or fires them after burning them out. Then does the same to the new ones. Until something obvious or tragic stops them. 3) Quiet destruction of personal lives. Sometimes leading to significant health and/or mental problems, related to stress, and even suicide in some cases.

Balance is necessary, because otherwise it can be like playing with fire. It's all "fun and games", until people get or realized they got burned.

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wage_theft

That's an interesting point. Agree that readability is somewhat subjective, but many programmers find .map, .filter, .reduce, etc... as more convenient and provides clarity as to their intentions. Many languages (like Vlang, Java, Python, etc...), arguably also have them to more closely align themselves with the functional programming paradigm.

That's not true. There are many natural and biodegradable alternatives for plastics that could be used, but aren't, and get blocked by oil companies and those they are paying off. Just like when action or laws against climate change are mentioned, there is a wave of opposition that traces back to oil money as well.

Basically, oil companies are being allowed to wreck havoc on the planet and our health, for the sake of maintaining their profits. The problem is the clock is ticking, and one can keep their head in the sand and pretend to ignore the danger for only so long, before inevitable reality happens.

If anything, such companies using keyloggers should be forced to openly state such practices to any potential employees. If they are really so proud of it, then don't be sneaky, let potential employees know about such practices and choose not to work for them.

Companies that need keyloggers, often have dysfunctional management and processes to evaluate employees, so need to resort to such desperate measures.

It doesn't appear to be as simple as that. She worked at the company for 18 years. If she was unproductive and committing fraud for all of the 18 years there, then that is a reflection of how incompetent her managers and the company's processes are.

To be employed by them, for so long, means that she was likely productive for most of her time there (then slacked off at some point) and/or how employees are managed and evaluated at that company is completely dysfunctional.

> I don’t like the privacy implications. However it sounds like her litigation was baseless so at least making her visible helps future employers avoid her and risk of litigation.

But the privacy implications should not be ignored, and it appears the company and media organizations seek to do further damage and harm, beyond what was required to win the case.

The ability of people to change or their right to seek future employment elsewhere, can't be ignored or purposely inhibited without creating more legal and litigation issues.

Many other languages give the backwards compatibility promise. For instance Vlang (https://vlang.io), does as well. But in their case, they limit it to a 3 year backward compatibility promise, which kind of makes more sense (also due to them being in beta). It gives them more flexibility to make needed changes to the language, but enough stability to limit issues for users. Though in general, such more open languages are going to be more responsive to users and their requests/needs, because of how they are structured.

The problem with Cloudflare is they purposely attempt to break user privacy by dangling websites as carrots. It's deception that they are attempting to determine if the person is human or not, because often they won't even show you the CAPTCHA. Even if you do get to the CAPTCHA, sucessfully doing it usually won't give you access to the website either. So, what is the point?

They want people to disable any privacy protections or push usage of browsers that have no to less privacy protections, in order to access the website they are blocking. This has nothing to do with if a user is an actual threat or bot, but is more a strategy to shape what browsers are used and destroy user privacy.

Cloudflare is also very aware of the numerous and constant complaints about what they are doing, coming from users and for years. They are ignored, because they have something else in mind.

Good example.

When this software is being sold to these departments, it's amazing that people in the chain don't seem to be talking enough about the training set used or performance on certain populations. If you are going to arrest or build a case on facial recognition, you would think that they would be prepared to defend its accuracy against a broad range of demographics. Embarrassing failures and mistaken arrests, hurts their program, not to mention the money the city losses in lawsuits.

> ...people have always had difficulty photographing very dark skin.

This appears to be a misinformed statement. Those who make it their business to take pictures of and process images of darker skin subjects, know how to use the technology, cameras, and software for better or optimal results[1][2][3].

The greater issue is about becoming knowledgeable and understanding the different techniques and lighting involved when dealing with lighter or darker subjects. There are those that are too deep into bias or too stubborn to study up on the subject, simply don't care to, or refuse to have different settings for people of different colors.

Unfortunately, it appears some are pushing claims or perpetuating stereotypes, as if it's not possible to solve the issue or that solutions haven't already been in existence (and in use) for the last 35 years (at least). If it would continue to be a problem, it's more a matter that certain jurisdictions and those in charge, care not to solve the issue or do anything about it. They might be quietly fine with mistaken arrests, false imprisonment, misusing AI, or abusing populations of color in general.

[1]: https://www.filmmakersacademy.com/lighting-black-skin-tones/

[2]: https://www.allure.com/story/photographing-darker-skin-tones

[3]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ERZLPePsN9s (Lighting Darker Skin Tones)

Such a tool not being open source and from unknown parties, says a lot by itself.

Exactly. This issue is very solvable and people have been using various solutions for many years. The hurdle is not technology, its other factors.

There is such a thing as lighting, type of lighting, using brighter lights, and processing of images[1][2][3]. From a technological and photography point of view, these types of issues can be resolved. Often the issue is the refusal to create a different setup for darker subjects, or purposefully injecting stereotypes or bias to not find or use obvious solutions.

Furthermore, because people have dark skin, doesn't mean they have the exact same bone structure, facial proportions, or symmetry.

[1]: https://creativecloud.adobe.com/discover/article/10-tips-for...

[2]: https://organicheadshots.com/how-to-photograph-people-of-col...

[3]: https://calgaryjournal.ca/2021/02/28/time-for-a-new-lens-the...