Languages of the Gods or Languages of the Brave?

Great, fun, insightful stuff from Giles Bowkett:

If there's anything godlike about using Lisp or Smalltalk when the rest of the world is on Java and C#, it isn't the skill level required. It's the balls. Standing up to the rest of the world and telling them, "your technology decisions are bad and I'm going to use a language that doesn't suck" is a very unusual move. It requires a lot of courage. But if you think about that, that's kind of bad. I mean, if what I'm saying is true, then the average technology business is kind of pathetic.

Unfortunately, I've worked for a very large number of different technology businesses, and I can tell you with confidence, certainty, and no fear of inaccuracy that the average technology business is indeed kind of pathetic.

Right on.

It's worth pointing out, the poster children for Lisp and Smalltalk are Paul Graham and Avi Bryant. Neither one of these guys actually had to stand up to management and tell them they were wrong. They just went ahead and started companies using better technology. Paul Graham obviously won pretty big when he did that. It's too early to tell with Avi Bryant, but there's no doubt at all that Dabble puts every other Web app in the world to shame.

My emphasis added.

Via Smalltalk Tidbits, Industry Rants