The problem isn't OOP, OOP's fine. The problem is how Java implemented Objects in a fairly rigid way which led to all this insane boilerplate. Furthermore design patterns aren't tied to OOP. And finally design patterns =/= JEE patterns .

There are about as many definitions of OOP as there are programming languages.

I'm not a software developer and have no dog in this fight. Sometimes I use Matlab's idea of OOP to factor out code by domain of representation (so simulations of agricultural yields are instances of a LandUnit object with some properties and one or two methods); never to abstract programming out the way OOP design patterns do.

I'm more attracted to the Haskell style of types and type classes, as far as "abstracting progrmaming out" goes, but I don't do any programming in the large, so what the hell do I know. I just pointed to the debate between people who should know, c2 wiki is very good on the things I do know.

Mostly a problem of how people use OOP.

I don't think there is a problem with the Java Language or the JVM.

Well, see, there are deep, deep problems with massive software projects. They don't have to be OOP.

But if you don't use OOP, what are you going to use that makes things significantly better? "There is no silver bullet", as Fred Brooks said.