Communication takes two participants; this thread showed that some folks are reading it as a personal attack on them or as a personal attack on others.
It's more important to me that I don't personally turn people off Pivotal. We talk a lot about empathy. I'm only human, sometimes I miss the mark. But we also talk about adapting to new information.
It's likely that I have accidentally turned away a bunch of bright people. Which works against my own interests and Pivotal's interests.
So given a choice between a little bit of literary flair and not coming across as mean, at the next opportunity, I'm going to choose to cut it out.
Don't let one or two people be the deciding factor when it was probably the best line out of any submission I've read.
The meaning was incredibly clear, to a point where I can't even fathom how there could be a misunderstanding.
You even said yourself that the inspiration was two people who were hesitant because of their PHP/PhD backgrounds, and I bet there are far more of those out there whom you're inviting to apply.
