[gambit-list] [MSLUG] Google Summer of Code

schemeway at sympatico.ca schemeway at sympatico.ca
Thu Mar 13 21:32:19 EDT 2008


>How about writing an implementation of AMQP with Termite?
>Success in this sector would definitely be a nice example of Scheme in
>the industry (with all your money relying on it ^^)

Why try competing with an existing product, written in a language that 
greatly eases its implementation? Unless you can convince me that Termite 
could ease the implementation of really distinctive features that would be 
hard (if not impossible) to implement in Erlang, I'm not sure that's such a 
nice idea.

I think Scheme, as a language, is still in need of a niche market where it 
could really stand out and provide a competitive advantage. But don't get me 
wrong. I'm not talking about programmer productivity here. On this front, 
Scheme/Lisp is a definite killer. But you cannot take a large market share 
in any industry solely based on programmer productivity (*). That's not how 
business works, unfortunately for us... You need a kiiler app that can't be 
easily reproducible in most other languages (the barrier to entry).

(*) Maybe for businesses in the SaaS (Software as a Service) space, where 
the implementation language is totally irrelevant to the end-user, Scheme 
could help reduce development costs, provide higher margins and faster time 
to market (read: profitability!). It can even enable features difficult to 
replicate in other languages, thus providing a competitive advantage. Much 
like Lisp did for Viaweb in the 90's. But it must remain a secret weapon. I 
know at least one large company in the speech recognition industry that used 
Lisp before being acquired by Microsoft. But they were not advertising their 
use of Lisp at all.

Dominique





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