Interesting that Guido finally gave up dealing with the haters at roughly the same time that Py2 is finally being replaced by Py3. It's almost as if there is some kind of maturity milestone that has been crossed, and it's time for things to change for good.
I hope for another BDFL or at least a king. Democracy is going to be a mess. Choose someone who wants to do it, agrees with Guido on as many as possible fundamental things and isn't too much of a revulotionary please.
Dennis: What I object to is you automatically treatin' me like an inferior.
Arthur: Well, I am king.
Dennis: Oh, king, eh? Very nice. And how'd you get that, then? By exploiting the workers! By hanging on to outdated imperialist dogma which perpetuates the economic and social differences in our society! If there's ever going to be any progress--
Dennis: We're an anarcho-syndicalist commune. We take it in turns to act as sort-of-executive officer for the week--
Arthur: Yes.
Dennis: But all the decisions of that officer have to be ratified at a special biweekly meeting--
Arthur: Yes, I see.
Dennis: By a simple majority, in the case of purely internal affairs--
Arthur: [getting bored] Be quiet.
Dennis: But by a two thirds majority, in the case of more major--
Arthur: Be quiet! I order you to be quiet!
Dennis' Mother: Order, eh? Who does he think he is?
Arthur: I am your king!
Dennis' Mother: Well I didn't vote for you.
Arthur: You don't vote for kings!
Dennis' Mother: How'd you become king, then?
Arthur: The Lady of the Lake, [Angel chorus begins singing in background] her arm clad in the purest shimmering samite, held aloft Excalibur from the bosom of the water signifying by Divine Providence that I, Arthur, was to carry Excalibur. [Angel chorus ends] That is why I am your king!
Dennis: Listen. Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government. Supreme executive power derives from a mandate from the masses, not from some farcical aquatic ceremony.
Arthur: Be quiet!
Dennis: You can't expect to wield supreme power just 'cause some watery tart threw a sword at you!
Arthur: Shut up!
Dennis: I mean, if I went 'round saying I was an emperor just because some moistened bint had lobbed a scimitar at me, they'd put me away!
Arthur: Shut up! Will you shut up?! [Grabs Dennis and shakes him]
Dennis: Ah, now we see the violence inherent in the system!
Arthur: Shut up!
Dennis: Oh! Come and see the violence inherent in the system! Help! Help! I'm being repressed!
OK, now that's cool. I wonder if Christian Heimes saw my post† on the HN topic on the 12th, or if we both proposed the idea independently?<p>†: <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17516186" rel="nofollow">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17516186</a>
Guido's leadership has really been what's kept Python so consistent during its evolution. This is in contrast to languages governed by committee or corporation.<p>Hopefully Python continues to be guided in this manner, and Guido can help rally the Python community around a successor.
Why not try a president of Python every 4 years with no term limits? Similar to BDFL, except there are chances for change and a consistent voice throughout a term. Voters would consist of core devs and PSF.
AFAICT, this article repeats the disaster of PEP572: it makes almost no effort to discuss how Python is used. Specifically, it implicitly holds that the BDFL + core contributors model that served Python so beautifully from, say, 1992 to 2002 when Python had perhaps 2 orders of magnitude fewer users than it does now and ran on—how can we know—3? 4? orders of magnitude fewer machines, should be taken for granted as the default governance mechanism for Python in 2018, when it is a key part of the world's infrastructure. I have no idea how to manage something as important as Python, but reading python-dev and seeing the brilliant Tim Peters, who was indispensable to Python's early growth, argue for a significant change in the language's semantics by using it to refactor a few samples from his personal code base, strikes me as prima facie evidence that neither do the core contributors. Millions. Of. People. Write. Python. That. Affects. The. Lives. Of. Billions. Of. People. Start there.