Despite common belief I believe that the less hype and general noise there is regarding a software project, the better off it is. For example, as Paul Graham notes regarding Java:
[Java] has been so energetically hyped. Real standards don’t have to be promoted. No one had to promote C, or Unix, or HTML. A real standard tends to be already established by the time most people hear about it. On the hacker radar screen, Perl is as big as Java, or bigger, just on the strength of its own merits.
In fact, I can argue that if your project receives a lot of negative hype, then it is an indication that it is successful. Perl, for example, has received (and still receives) a lot of criticism, and Perl aficionados often get tired of constantly hearing or seeing the same repetitive and tired arguments by its opponents. However, the perl 5 interpreter is in good shape, it has many automated tests (much more than most other competing dynamic languages), an active community, many modules on CPAN ( the Comprehensive Perl Archive Network) with a lot of third-party , open-source functionality, and relatively few critical bugs. It is still heavily actively used and has many fans.
Similar criticism has been voiced against the Subversion version control system, Linux, etc. One thing one can notice about such highly-criticised projects is that they tend not to be bothered by it too much. Rather, what they say is that “If you want to use a competing project, I won’t stop you. It probably is good. It may be better in some respects. I like my own project and that’s what I’m used to using and use.”
This is by all means the right policy of “hyping” to adopt, if you want your project to be successful based on its own merits. Some projects compete for the same niche, without voicing too much hype against each other or for them, and this is a better indication that they are all healthy.