You are right that the dynamic arrays story does not read like a straightforward “how to inspire contributions.” But part of what I wanted to do in the talk was to show things as they actually unfolded. In OCaml compiler development, there is a very strong emphasis on correctness and long-term stability. That can make contributions, especially to core language features, feel harder than they might in faster-moving ecosystems.
The dynamic arrays case is a good illustration. What began as a small PR grew into years of design iterations, debates about representation, performance, and multicore safety, and eventually a couple of thousand lines of code and more than 500 comments before it landed. From one perspective, that looks discouraging. From another, it shows the weight we place on getting things right, because once a feature ships, it is very hard to undo.
That tension, between wanting to be open and encouraging contributions but also needing to protect stability, is something I think we should be talking about openly. My hope is that by making the process more visible we can demystify it and help contributors understand not just what happened, but why.