Add Scala Highlights from 2024

[adpi2]

[SethTisue]

Adrien says he will publish on Wednesday unless there is further review feedback

[SethTisue]

before merge we need to change this:

by: The Scala Organization

as we're not using that phrase in public communication. I'll discuss with Darja what it should say instead. ("Scala"? "The Scala Center", which is the actual coordinating organization here?)

[SethTisue]

Darja raised a couple concerns about https://www.scala-lang.org/blog/

one is that it currently has this:

which is 1) wildly out of date (the links are ancient), and 2) could be confused with the new Scala Highlights

I think we can just get rid of this.

the other is the blog categories:

the categories are confusing, that's a longstanding issue: #1006

but Darja would like to have a "Highlights" category, which I do think makes sense. if one or more of the other categories needs to be eliminated to make room for it, then great.

[adpi2]

as we're not using that phrase in public communication. I'll discuss with Darja what it should say instead. ("Scala"? "The Scala Center", which is the actual coordinating organization here?)

I know the Highlights cover more than just the compiler. But in practice we are all part of the Scala Core Team, so I would claim we should use Scala Core Team. Or I can say Scala Center, Lamp, VirtusLab and Akka. But I don't think anyone from outside really cares about the subtle difference between this and that.

[adpi2]

which is 1) wildly out of date (the links are ancient), and 2) could be confused with the new Scala Highlights
I think we can just get rid of this.

Done :)

the categories are confusing, that's a longstanding issue: #1006

but Darja would like to have a "Highlights" category, which I do think makes sense. if one or more of the other categories needs to be eliminated to make room for it, then great.

I merged Blog and News and added the Highlights section, with just this blog post inside.

[SethTisue]

thanks @zainab-ali, I pushed 0b9b0f6 which uses "our" to avoid that phrase

[zainab-ali]

Grammatically, I think this should be one of:

## How you can support Scala
## How to support Scala
## How can I support Scala?

Given that we refer to your in the paragraph below, How you can support Scala might work best.

With that said, there are many other initiatives that would appeal to the Scala developer the Highlights are intended for. It might be better to ask for community participation in discussions, events and OSS projects.

Instead of asking them to join the advisory board, this could ask individual Scala developers for donations and to persude their workplace to join the board.

[zainab-ali]

Thanks @SethTisue !

The comments added afterwards are all pretty minor - I was mid-review during the blog post release, and figured I'd submit them anyway.

[SethTisue]

Good suggestions/concerns. I pushed two of the suggested changes: 7852c38

@adpi2 could you respond to the others?

[adpi2]

I pushed two more suggested changes in a705582 and dea97d4

[zainab-ali]

Thanks so much for addressing these this even though the post has been published!

I've added a couple of last suggestions, after feedback from sharing the post.

[zainab-ali]

Minor note: since we're listing them, we could add links to each one:

We’re especially pleased to see Scala-specific conferences such as [Scala.IO](https://scala.io) (Paris), [Scala Matsuri](https://scalamatsuri.org) (Tokyo), [Scalar](https://www.scalar-conf.com) and [Art of Scala](https://artofscala.com) (Warsaw), and [Functional Scala](https://www.functionalscala.com) (virtual) continuing.

[SethTisue]

hmm, I wouldn't be opposed to having individual links, but I more or less intentionally didn't do it since all those same links are already at https://www.scala-lang.org/events

[SethTisue]

in 66100aa I added ", with links" to emphasize that a bit