> Instead of being able to immediately see the syntax so they can rush back here to make insightful and educated comments on how that syntax compares to $their_fave_lang, they are forced to spend up to 4 or even 5 minutes reading documents clearly describing the design of the language, and being obliged to click on their mouses up to 10 times even in some cases.

Welcome to interface design! Your way of thinking could not be more wrong if you tried :)

How buying stuff on say Amazon works:

1. Click on picture of a car

2. Click "Buy Now"

How it would look like if we apply yours/the Pony website designers' approach:

1. Read a 10 page description of what the car is

2. Click on a link buried on page 12 that lets you buy the thing

Which approach gets more sales?

> 1. Read a 10 page description of what the car is

> 2. Click on a link buried on page 12 that lets you buy the thing

But the link to the playground is on page 1, the home page, and not page 12? So your whole argument is moot, since it seems the Pony people obeyed at least this part of your interface design dogma.

Or, in other words, "you could not be more wrong if you tried :)".

The issue here was that page 2 was linked in the title, so everyone was getting to page 2, and not clicking back to page 1, where the playground was, and instead clicking forward and getting lost.

And all that aside, as another commenter said, even if the playground was hidden behind the most fiendish of mazes -- perhaps not every programming language is interested in attracting the kind of people who think every corner of the universe must mirror Amazon's approach to "sales".

I don't know about you, but I'm not sure I'd be all that interested in a programming language that is focused on scoring sales.