I was using Elm full-time back then, and I think some important context to note is that 0.18 had outstanding issues which had seen no movement for years (and PRs were generally ignored). The official guidance was “wait for 0.19.” While 0.19 addressed many or all of these issues, it came with a number of breaking changes, some very significant. It also coincided with a reorganization of the GitHub repos which happened to scrub all past issues, PRs, and discussion as well as a more stringent moderation policy on the official forums.