<i>In conclusion, I really don't understand what the problem is here.</i><p>I think it's just that this:<p><pre><code> (setf (gethash "foo" *hash*) "OH HAI")
</code></pre>
is verbose and funny-looking compared to:<p><pre><code> hash["foo"] = "OH HAI"</code></pre>
Note, most of the discussion is taking place on this duplicate: <a href="http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=449345" rel="nofollow">http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=449345</a>