Actually I was struck the other way: this appears to be basically unchecked exceptions. Functions return errors, which you can check or not if you like. The only difference is that the "exception" doesn't unwind the stack any more than the function call.

So this guy goes on about how bad unchecked exceptions are, then waxes poetic about Go's, erm, unchecked exceptions.

To add to the weirdness, he seems to think that most people like checked exceptions, when in fact he appears to be very much in the minority.