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Alan Kay Interview: Computing Past and Future 108

Posted by michael from the montessori-school dept.
suzipaw writes "In this interview on OpenP2P.com, Kay has some interesting observations about both the past and future of computing--including kids using technology. Says Kay, "Montessori would have been a great innovator with computers.""
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Alan Kay Interview: Computing Past and Future More

Alan Kay Interview: Computing Past and Future

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  • My kid loves her computer (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Voltronalpha ( 244088 ) on Saturday April 05, 2003 @04:48AM (#5667836)
    My child loves her computer; she is 3 1/2 and uses it for 2-3 hours everyday. It has replaced the time in her day where she would usually sit and watch a Disney movie or some other such, now she is challenging her mind instead of taking backseat. Kids and computers do mix.

    On the plus side at preschool there are two computers that the kids use/watch other kids use, exposure seems to be key.

    • Re:My kid loves her computer (Score:2, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward
      i grew up with computers, around the age of 6 i was a regular on a bunch of local BBSes and also running my own, with DOS and stuff. i feel these days i have much less curiousity and ability to learn, i wish i could go back to the mindset i had in those days so i can figure things out just as fast as i did back then.

      ever since i enrolled in university i've been much less active, so to speak. in high school i used to love hacking around the school district servers, the local security and protection, the pro

    • Re:My kid loves her computer (Score:1, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Please, be careful. I grew up with computers, and I'm a complete fucking mess.
    • 2-3 hours is a huge amount of time... I honestly cannot see how that would be good for her.

      I have two boys (5 and 7), and I encourage them to go outside and play, play with Lego building blocks (not legso :-)).

      They each have thier own computer (old laptops) and they do play some games such as Reader Rabbit, etc. But I purposefully limit the amount of time spend in front of it. I just don't see how it can be good for them to sit there for hours.
      • There are several hours in a day, and for a child that isn't even three yet, I can't say that there exists a tremendous quantity of things for them to be doing to fill their time. Simply being outside for an extra two hours or so isn't going to make a tremendous difference in their capacity to kick or run, and in reality I see most small children spending much of their free time watching television.

        The grandparent poster indicated that their child replaced Disney films with computer use, something that s

      • Beats them spending the same time in front of the Vacuum Tube watching the garbage on it, doesn't it?

        (ok, unless you can restrict their TV time to more educational things such as Discovery Channel and whatever else is available nowadays - beats me, I haven't watched TV in years)

        SB
      • 2-3 hours is a good chunk of time the 5 hours she spends at preschool is an even bigger chunk. I was actually worried that she would not take to the machine and just want to watch movies for this portion of her day. I'm ecstatic she would rather interact and use her brain than sit and watch. She's in no danger of not learning her social skills, for as much as she likes her computer she LOVES to interact with other kids.

        I also limit the time my daughter uses her computer as mentioned before (2-3 hours tops)
    • Exposure is a great thing. I can remember the veyr first computer I used. It was a blue and white 286 laptop which could run the alf spelling game. It was great. The next computer I had was in 1992 when my dad bought us a 486. At first I was quite annoyed and boycotted using it because when we were getting it we had a choice of either getting the computer or going on a trip to disney land. I of course wanted to go to disney land but my brother got his way and we got the computer. I never really became inter

    • So, she just fits in the floppy drive, then?

  • Doesn't do much for me (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Mattygfunk1 ( 596840 ) on Saturday April 05, 2003 @04:57AM (#5667852)
    In my opinion this article sounds more like a long promotion rather than anything with substance.

    A lot of criticisms about how what everyone else is doing is wrong without offering an alternative, and gloating that "he did it first".

    Nothing against Alan personally, but he reminds me of team motivators that are great at speaking theory but lack giving true direction.

    __ cheap web site hosting [cheap-web-...ing.com.au] FAQ

    • But listening to one of the true innovaters of our time is not something I would want to miss if I was in the area.
    • If I had to make an equally offensive and presumptious statement, it would be that you're using a formulaic means of "whoring" kharma. Your comment is all criticism about the intent of the article and the self-opinion of their subject, with no real substance. Pfffft.

      The article is indeed a promotion. It's telling you:
      1. Who Alan Kay is, and what he's helped contribute.
      2. That he's giving a talk at an O'Reilly function.
      3. A general idea of what the talk will be about.
      4. A few of the reasons Kay feels
      • Firstly well argued. Some of your comments are spot on - while I did criticize I didn't offer a "solution" myself.

        I would say however, that the article didn't offer us anything new. Slashdot is a (sorta) news service. Personally I want to read something that is either new to me or an "out of left field" controversial opinion that has the potential to shake things up a bit.

        As you concede the article is a promotion, if one on an interesting topic from an interesting speaker. It is just not what I clasify as

  • Squeak Wiki (Score:1, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward
    For all the hype about Squeak, it's just another closed smalltalk world.


    The real innovation to come from the Kay camp is the pervasive collaborative editors that now manafest themselves as Wikiwebs.

    • Closed? Which part of Open Source didn't you follow? you can get full sources to the image and VM, and change whatever you want. Heck, even for commercial systems like VisualWorks, customers or educational users can get full source - including VM sources - and make whatever changes they want. I don't think you read the same article I did.

  • Kids and Computers (Score:5, Insightful)

    by 1nsane0ne ( 607735 ) on Saturday April 05, 2003 @05:01AM (#5667862) Journal
    I've taught computer classes to kids before (ages 5 - 14 ) and it is amazing what some of them can do. It's neat to see which ones are confident enough to tinker with things and don't fear making mistakes, the same qualities many /.'ers had in their formative years I'm sure. By sitting in a lab with a few kids and doing something like blocking their favorite website, 9 times out of 10 the kids that go and find away around whatever you did are the ones that relate best to other people and kids. A little bit different then the older stereotypical geek I suppose. Back to the article, I think that besides the internet there has been no real boom in the computer reveloution during my lifetime at least, but then again I'm young and the lowest end machine I got to tinker with was a 286. I'm sure those of you who still have their commie 64's around have some other examples, but quite frankly, I missed all those. The way I see it the computer revolution has been a slow and steady battle with little booms along the way.

    • Internet Boom (Score:3, Interesting)

      by rf0 ( 159958 )
      Going from what I've seen of recent computer history the booms seem to just sneak up. For example the net really became big in about 97/98 here is europe and it caught everyone off guard. Even Microsoft said "the internet isn't relevant" and then turned around and released IE. I'm sure there is going to be another boom its just trying to work out what it is

      Rus
    • 9 times out of 10 the kids that go and find away around whatever you did are the ones that relate best to other people and kids

      I find it best to differentiate between kids and real people as well.

      I seem to remember that the most socializing I did as a kid with regards to computing was the illicit trade of copied C64 games tapes. Apart from the actual gaming, everything else seemed to be a largely solitary pursuit, probably as the home revolution was still in its infancy. I'm not sure, but I feel that

    • Re:Kids and Computers and boys and Ritalin (Score:2, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward
      The trouble is, darned few kids are taught to program, they just sit in front of the screen filling out multiple choice answers. It's used mainly as a scoring aid for teacher.

      Inquisitive and restless boys, the troublemakers, are sent to the school nurse, who then has a talk with the parents about ADHD. Parents then get from SSI a $450 check for their disabled child being treated with vitamin R.

      and when these powers of expression bring forth a new way to discuss, think, and argue about important ideas.
      • That reminds me of something that happened to me back in elementary school. We had a computer lab with a bunch of old macs running system 7, and we were told to open a certain "educational program". Mine wouldn't run, because there wasn't enough memory. So, inquisitive child that I was, I went and turned on virtual memory. Only a megabyte, but after that the program worked fine. Only thing was, the teacher found out about it, gave me a little lecture about how I could have messed something up very very badl
    • By sitting in a lab with a few kids and doing something like blocking their favorite website, 9 times out of 10 the kids that go and find away around whatever you did are the ones that relate best to other people and kids.

      Well duh, of course, because they are the heroes that bring you the pr0n. Ah, it always drives the tech forward..

  • Kids and Computers (Score:5, Insightful)

    by rf0 ( 159958 ) <rghf@fsck.me.uk> on Saturday April 05, 2003 @05:07AM (#5667879) Homepage
    To survive in todays world I agree that kids need to be able to use computers but one thing that concerns me is that an increasing number of people are seeing the computer as an alternative to having human interaction. I've seen a few kids who are 4/5 and have no idea about how to interact socially. There more than quite and shy they are withdrawn.

    There should be a balance and I would think that it would be better to spend time with parents that technology. Just call me old fashioned it you want

    Rus

    • Re:Kids and Computers (Score:5, Insightful)

      by iq in binary ( 305246 ) <iq_in_binary AT hotmail DOT com> on Saturday April 05, 2003 @05:19AM (#5667896) Homepage
      Being someone who had to completely re-build his social skills due to computer use, I am torn between agreeing and disagreeing.

      I used to get the crap kicked out of me every day (literally) by kids who saw me as a threat due to my intelligence. I stopped this by withdrawing completely from any personal social interaction.

      Time eventually came where I "re-introduced" myself to the world. The fact I had been a social recluse for the past 3 years gave me a whole new spin on life once I actively sought one. I wholely believe this is for the better. Having been a social recluse for so long made real social interaction a learning experience for me.

      Due to that, I'm now one of the most popular people in my area. This isn't even intentional. More than likely, it is due to the extreme change in environment and need to acclimate myself.

      Tough situations are much better learning and cementing tools than people realize. Had I not shut myself off for awhile in my pubescant years, I'd probably just another wasted youth in America's ghetto.

      Children aren't meant to handle social situations as well as adults can. Sometimes taking them out of the social situation for a small while is the best thing to do, considering how much they'll actually learn once put back in the situation.

      • Re:Kids and Computers (Score:5, Interesting)

        by rf0 ( 159958 ) <rghf@fsck.me.uk> on Saturday April 05, 2003 @05:24AM (#5667909) Homepage
        I will admit that I use to be similar in being intelligent and that works against you. However a few years ago I decided to turn my life round as well and now I've got a life, a gf and actually go out. Perhaps I work a bit to much but I'm a lot happier. I just can't help but think though I should of spent more of my childhood out playing..

        Rus
      • Dare I suggest that lack of social skills due to computer use will be less of a problem in the future, as computer use will be less dependent on sitting down in a room in front of a desktop to become something you can do just about anywhere, in the company of your friends.
        The hacker minority will probably stick to the old fashioned way, at least during heavy-duty programming sessions, but most kids will surely embrace mobile computing when it comes (wearable computers not far off?).
      • I was actually the same way. Throughout high school, I was quite antisocial. Once in college, however, I decided to actively be more social and now when I go out, people I don't even remember come up to me and say "what's up, Dave?" I actually just broke up with my girlfriend because all she wanted to do was sit at home and watch TV. I just can't live my life like that anymore.

        I think the important thing to consider about children and computers is what they would be doing otherwise. It's probably a good thi

    • It's also a little more than just computers. I drove past my old school busstop on a quick trip through the neighbourhood one morning, just before work. One of those spur of the moment things.

      At the busstop were 5 schoolkids waiting for the bus - and at the time I went past EVERY one was on their cell phone, none talking to the other. (not face to face anyway, hell they could have all been on a party line to each other for all I know :)

      While that's not a complete lack of human interaction, neither is a lo

      • Re:Kids and Computers (Score:5, Insightful)

        by rf0 ( 159958 ) <rghf@fsck.me.uk> on Saturday April 05, 2003 @05:31AM (#5667924) Homepage
        When kids are old enough yes then I can see IM being reasonable as a form of communication. As for the mobile least the kids were talking. What I'm more concerened about is when kids are very young. They aren't going to use IM/IRC and I wouldn't let my kids over fears of security.

        Its the 5 years old I worry about and would make to sure any kids I have will goto kindergarden so they at least learn what is socailly acceptable

        Hey just my opinion

        Rus

      • Re:Kids and Computers (Score:1, Funny)

        by Anonymous Coward
        The current joy of tech [joyoftech.com] is oh so apt for this discussion.

  • Refelctions... (Score:4, Interesting)

    by evilviper ( 135110 ) on Saturday April 05, 2003 @05:17AM (#5667893) Journal
    Yes, all you get in the article are refections such as We were doing great things, and Computers aren't going where they should be. As with most similar interviews, there is nothing about what we SHOULD be doing now, just that we aren't doing it...

    People, if you aren't happy with computers, come up with where they should be going, and why. A GUI was a natural evolution for the computer... What exactly do we need next? Come-on all you "visionaries"...

    • Re:Refelctions... (Score:3, Informative)

      by baryon351 ( 626717 )
      It's interesting you raise the issue of the GUI as a natural evolution. I remember in the mid-80s when I had my first Amiga, the complete disdain that practically anyone I knew who owned a computer felt towards a GUI or computer with graphics was amazing. It certainly took time and visionaries to push the idea of a GUI, not as an optional gimmick, but bundle it with every machine - or as with the mac, make do with ONLY a GUI. for 15 years or more.
      • I was thinking this the other day, remembering having arguments with the other two geek friends I had as a kid as to the point of a GUI...

        I read some article somewhere extolling the virtues of a GUI in highly theoretical terms, and got all excited, managed to get my hands on an early copy of Windows and tried to convince my friends that this was the way of the future...

        they rolled their eyes at me, and after about a week of messing around with it, I trashed Windows from my machine. Did I ever think that w
      • It certainly took time and visionaries to push the idea of a GUI

        I think you misunderstood the point. While computers were only text, things like televisions were graphical. Sure, there was discussion about if there is any advantage to a GUI, but the technology was there for anyone to make use of.
    • Until computers can actually understand our thoughts and do what we want them to do rather than what we told them I don't think people will become happy. Of course that would mean that we would all be Borg but hey...

      Rus

    • Re:Refelctions... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by FunkyRat ( 36011 ) <funkyrat&gmail,com> on Saturday April 05, 2003 @06:16AM (#5667998) Journal

      I'm not sure whether you are trying to troll or if you're just a little igonorant about the history of the computer.

      Back in the early 1970s, GUIs were not a natural evolution for computers. They only appear so in retrospect because Steve Jobs happened to get a tour of Xerox PARC and decided that GUIs should be the next step in the evolution of computers. I daresay that Jobs (and Woz's) experiences growing up playing (and later writing) video games influenced the decision to base the Lisa and then the Mac's OS around a GUI but had Jobs not had his little tour about PARC it's arguable that the PC revolution would never have happened and the CLI would still be dominant today.

      Alan Kay and his fellow researchers at Xerox PARC and preceeded by Doug Englebart at SRI are the real thing - true visionaries. It's easy to knock their accomplishments 35+ years out (Englebart et. al. developed NLS in 1967! ) because we've had that long for their ideas to percolate into mass culture. Yeah, I know, the Mac has only been with us since 1984 but really, Englebart and later Kay were subtly but powerfully through their work and demonstrations preparing the way for the dominance of the GUI. Also, as I made allusion to before, don't forget the powerful role that video games had in preparing the kids of the 70s and 80s in ways that would make GUIs seem second nature.

      So yeah, I've got to agree, this interview was pretty weak. However, if you want to see where Kay really envisioned that we'd be right now, take a look at the copious information out there regarding Dynabook, Smalltalk and his work at Xerox PARC. Then take a swing by squeak.org [squeak.org], download a copy and play around with it for a while. It's hard not to be impressed. As far as where we go next, that's up to all of us, including you. Personally, I'd like to start working in some strong AI and humaniform robots, but that's my hangup. Perhaps you have a different destination in mind.


      Note: I'm not sure of Steve Jobs actual role at Xerox PARC. I've read differing accounts ranging from the tourist picture I paint above to his actually being a researcher there. Can anybody clarify?

      • I would say that this 'interview' is mostly written to tell the reader why they might be interested in seeing Alan Kay speak at the O'Reilly conference on the 24th.

        For the people (and I don't mean you, but rather the grandparent and other similar posters) that constantly crap themselves with the "Well what should we do then, Smart Guy?!" attitude, are just inherently resentful towards the positions and accomplishments of researchers from before their time. Even if Alan had absolutely, positively, no idea

      • ... because Steve Jobs happened to get a tour of Xerox PARC and decided that GUIs should be the next step in the evolution of computers.

        Correct as far as it goes. Two small additions from a former Xeroid (Xerox AI Systems - just down the road from PARC- 1986-88):

        At the time of the jobs PARC visit, Xerox was a significant investor in Apple, owning something like 15% of its shares. That's how he got the tour.

        Jobs was given the tour over the strenuous objections of many of the PARC researchers. They kne

        • Somebody please mod the parent up!

          Thank you! I've long wondered how Jobs managed to get inside PARC. I'd never known that Xerox held a large portion of Apple shares. Fumbling The Future is one of those books that is on my "list" along with about 500 others.

          It really is amazing that Xerox never could realize the potential in what it had. The Star, 3 years ahead of the Mac, was amazing. IIRC, and I apologize if my memory is faulty, you guys at Xerox AI Systems did a lot of work in making practical expert sy

          • Fumbling the Future is a fast read, but a good one. It alternates between history of PARC research and development (stuff like people working weekends wire-wrapping workstation boards, so they could join the party faster) and the history of the business decisions around PARC.

            The most telling story in the book is about the Star's coming-out party, at a big Xerox new-products show. They set up a room full of Stars, file servers and printers, and showed them off to a bunch of senior VPs and their wives. Th
          • Well, you have to bear in mind that the people at Apple extolling user interface were already familiar with PARC. Chiefly this would be Jef Raskin, who had been working with UI issues since the 60's. However, Jobs, who didn't get it, was a bigwig at Apple and was threatening the future of the Macintosh project and their exporting of UI features into the Lisa project. So the PARC tour Jobs took was more to get him to support what other people were doing, or at least stop interfering. People doing real work d
      • Note: I'm not sure of Steve Jobs actual role at Xerox PARC. I've read differing accounts ranging from the tourist picture I paint above to his actually being a researcher there. Can anybody clarify?

        Mostly, that's a myth. First, Parc was never that secretive. I got the tour and demo in 1975 while taking a class in computer architecture, years before Jobs did. Met Alan Kay and Adele Goldberg, and saw an early version of Smalltalk running a discrite-event simulation.

        Second, the Lisa was the innovative

      • Back in the early 1970s, GUIs were not a natural evolution for computers. They only appear so in retrospect because Steve Jobs happened to get a tour of Xerox PARC and decided that GUIs should be the next step in the evolution of computers

        No. The only thing that tour of Xerox did was to (perhaps) change the time-line. Since we had TVs, it's only natural that computers would develop into devices that had graphical output. Perhaps it happened earlier than it otherwise would have, but I have no doubt that

    • Except that people like Alan Kay are doing new things, continuing to be visionaries. See Squeak Smalltalk (http://www.squeak.org) - the platform of development for Alan Kay and a lot of others. They are doing a lot of cool, new stuff- most of which is written off by most Slashkiddies because it isn't C/GTK+/Unix.
      • I didn't say they weren't... Mainly just that the article didn't contain much info, and the things they are doing aren't addressing their own complaints.

        eg.:
        Kay: Computers should be doing so much more by now.
        Me: What should they be doing that they aren't?
        Kay: .....
  • Kids are remarkably adaptable, but they lack the handling of highly complicated verbage structures. i.e. most kids can build complex things with blocks and lego bricks, but can't handle the abstract reading, writing required for most comupter languages. As adult programmers we should work to fix that--it will also benifit other older people as well. Kids are resilliant and love to play. That could be used to create all sorts of interfaces and study the effect on the kids-and the kids effect on the inter

    • after all these years why are we still programming with text files? there are so many other possibilities. Not everything needs to be on a screen! We could use Blocks, music, colors, lights, shapes--with today's tech the possibilities are endless!

      Squeak incorporates a system called eToys wherein the user draws objects on the screen and then programs them using drag-and-drop "tiles" that represent the various properties and actions associated with the object.

      I haven't played much with it myself, and it'

    • I just saw a Lego commercial on TV. What the hell has happened to them? They used to be fun toys when they were just multi-colored blocks. Now, they're 'action figures' that don't even come apart! $100 gets you a pre-molded 'toy' that might have a few pieces that you can move around. Yay...

      Who had Capsula growing up? What about Erector Sets? Hell, even Voltron was more educational than Legos are now. Don't waste your money.

    • Check out National Instrument's LabView.. certainly not for kids, but kind of a cool environment. It's basically like a flow chart or circuit diagram that you plug code into... it's mostly for data aquisition.. but a neat concept :)

  • My kids (Score:4, Funny)

    by skillet-thief ( 622320 ) on Saturday April 05, 2003 @06:44AM (#5668031) Homepage Journal
    I want my kids to be able to code Perl before they can walk.

    Otherwise I'm going to trade them in.

    • Re:My kids (Score:5, Insightful)

      by melonman ( 608440 ) on Saturday April 05, 2003 @07:16AM (#5668062) Journal

      And mine are on the street if they learn PHP at any point... Although, actually, children learn to talk before they learn to draw, so why should mastering computer language come 12 years after mastering point and click? Or, conversely, why are GUIs so shallow?

      The GUIs we have now generally have the grammatical sophistication of a 2 year-old: "Want THAT, Don't want THAT, move THAT, and THAT, and THAT..." Seeing Kay's name go past again makes me nostalgic for an age when interface designers dreamed bold dreams, when object-oriented meant more than another way of managing libraries, when we really thought that GUIs could become languages rather than cave paintings revisited. I remember playing with GUI code on a Symbolics 15 years ago that still makes any modern GUI seem incredibly limited, and this despite having 100 times the processing power we had then.

      I think we settled for a parody of the original dream.

      • And mine are on the street if they learn PHP at any point...

        Some high schools [bbspot.com] would agree with you. :)

        ("B-but Dad! It's not mine! Denny brought it over on his Red Hat Distribution! And I didn't use it... he just installed it...")
      • Even though Alan Kay is often mentioned as a dim shadow of the past, in reality he's busily working on what may be the cutting edge of many computing aspects. The Squeak project is his current baby. I heartily recommend it to anyone who pines for the good old days when programming was fun, and only seriously undertaken by those who thought it so.

        http://www.squeak.org

        Get it. Have fun. Show it to your kids. :)

  • Kids & computers (Score:3, Insightful)

    by klui ( 457783 ) on Saturday April 05, 2003 @07:22AM (#5668067)
    Speaking as someone who has developed RSI from working on computers, I would suggest those of you who have kids that use computers at an early age that you both limit their time spent on the machines and have them sit, use the keyboard and mouse/track ball properly.

    If not, they will develop habits that will be difficult to break once they get into their early-to-mid 20s--then they'll be in trouble. Have them develop good habits to start with.
    • I totally agree with this. I am fourteen right now, and I use a "modifed hunt and peck". I can type about 110 a minute, but I am pretty sure I will not be able to go any faster with out going to Home Row Style. DONT LET YOUR KIDS HUNT AND PECK!
      • Actually, "hunt and peck" is OK! When one use hunt and peck, they're probably typing without their palms resting on armrests which is good. Your nerves are very close to your palms and if you type while your palms are resting against something, they will cause problems in the long run. Touchtyping also allows one to overreach towards the intended keys and that's bad. Worse is typing while slouching, wrists and arms not in a neutral position, head not resting properly, and inadequate lighting conditions.
  • This is the social problem of the current decade.

    I am pushing for my local supermarket to have an "Old People Only" checkout isle, with old people banned from all other checkouts, so that I don't have to wait behind some crusty old fart paying by cheque because they're scared that using their debit card (which their bloody bank sent them anyway) might kill them.
    • actually that's a good pointer to where we are going:

      -there will be the people that use computers
      -there will be the people that write the software
      -there will be a bunch of people stuck on a remote island because they can't do either

  • worked for me (Score:3, Funny)

    by Trepidity ( 597 ) <delirium-slashdot@@@hackish...org> on Saturday April 05, 2003 @07:32AM (#5668076)
    I spent nearly all my time on the computer when I was a kid, and it's made me socially confident and popular with the ladies!

  • What will computers *be*, to kids. (Score:5, Interesting)

    by dmorin ( 25609 ) <{moc.liamg} {ta} {niromd}> on Saturday April 05, 2003 @07:42AM (#5668092) Homepage Journal
    Once upon a time computers were thought to be really fancy calculators.

    Then people started thinking about them as fancy typewriters.

    Then, databases. I remember working at a retail computer store in the late 80's and actually using the "mom can store her recipes" argument.

    Somewhere in there they were seen as having the potential to be generic problem solvers. But I think that view was only ever held by developers, not users.

    I think kids see the computer as a communication device. IM is the world to lots of them.

    I, like many Slashdotters, saw my first computer at the age of about 10 where if you wanted a new video game you learned assembly language and wrote your own. I spend the next 20 years listening to people say things like "Oh, my 2yr old is into the computer just like you were!" Yeah, sure. The 2yr old likes to wiggle the mouse, I was hacking 6809 assembly. That's the same thing. But kids now have simply learned to see the computer for its communication ability, and don't necessarily care to see it as a machine that can be turned into new things. Sure, they like to personalize the hell out of it. Skinning your programs, generating new icons, that's all the rage. But the percentage of 10yr olds that are out there thinking about new IM programs to write is probably about the same as its always been. I've always been a firm believer that hackers are born, not made, a kid who is destined to hack will show an intuition for it from the minute she sits down at the keyboard, and a kid who isn't will be bored and distracted in programming classes.

    • You have some good points there.
      There are still some little hackers in the making out there, perhaps even more than before, but the great majority of the kids see computers as a toy/tool. I think that's ok, since most of them will be using computers as a tool in their professional careers but not necessarily as programmers. They need to be computer literate as users not as hackers.
      What troubles me is that some of these future users when faced with the big decision of choosing their undergraduate course, w

  • its just a part of evolution (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Rooked_One ( 591287 ) on Saturday April 05, 2003 @07:51AM (#5668103) Journal
    As the human species progress over the course of time, without destroying itself, it will inherently gain many qualities. One of which is, since we've developed many ways to aid in our progress, to make machines that will aid in our progress. To think otherwise is insane - do you know anyone that would have taken Pi to the extent pc's have? I thought not.

    As computers become more common place humans will evolve further. We will no longer have to invest in hard core brain power, and perhaps will concentrate on a different role. If you disagree with darwinism please disregard this post entirely, I don't want to say anything but my opinion. As computers start to do some things for us we will learn how to do other things we couldn't imagine of doing right now. The question is - will we get there without losing sight of what is really important?

    If I lost you, I apologize in advance - mod this down all you want :)

    • As the human species progress over the course of time, without destroying itself, it will inherently gain many qualities. One of which is, since we've developed many ways to aid in our progress, to make machines that will aid in our progress. To think otherwise is insane - do you know anyone that would have taken Pi to the extent pc's have? I thought not.
      As computers become more common place humans will evolve further.

      Computers have yet to exist long enough for them to effect evolution. And before you ge
  • He says there isnt much effort in trying to improve computing.
    To me, there are many efforts in several fronts.
    In fact, due to the mass of information and geographic distance, many of these efforts are hard to track, even if you tried.
    • > ... much effort in trying to improve computing ...
      > ... there are many efforts in several fronts ...
      > ... many of these efforts are hard to track ...

      If there are so many efforts, how about a few links instead of a content-free post?

      • Ace: http://research.sun.com/projects/ace/petstore.html MDA: http://www.omg.org/mda/ .NET: http://www.microsoft.com/net/ And I am not a researcher of this stuff, but these projects did impress me. I see the merging of the mobile phones and the TVs with the computers as important improvements as well. Wireless rocks but needs security improvements. Cheers.
  • "Programming" is, or should be, about problem solving. Computing is about extending the range of problems that human beings can solve. In essence it works like all other thinking prosthetics, by substituting a different, easier to manage API.

    When I went to school in the precomputer age, mutiplying and dividing decimal numbers (a hard process) was handled with logarithm tables, which substituted an API of a two dimensional + interpolation table search plus addition and subtraction. It wasn't a very good API,

  • I am currently a fourteen year old, and I, as many others here at /. , love technology. The most important thing, I think, is to make sure your school is flexible. Instead of sitting in a study hall an hour a day, the computer teaches let me work on the web sites, on the year book, on the end of the year slide show, and sometimes on the server. If the school your child is going to right now does not have a fairly "open to new ideas" computer staff, look for an alternative.

  • in an article about the computer revolution, (Score:3, Funny)

    by sstory ( 538486 ) on Saturday April 05, 2003 @01:49PM (#5668940) Homepage
    we find this sentence: " I spoke to him by phone while scribbling madly to keep up with him."

    Yeah, I'd certainly agree that you aren't using electronic tools to their maximum if you are writing madly to record what someone's saying.

  • My daughter is almost 4. She is a great artist. She loves to draw, color, paint, etc.

    My wife and I decided that we would use the computer as a tool for her growth and development, but not as a time-waster/babysitter. And, I didn't want her to have to "learn the computer," a complex interface in and of itself.

    I have it set up so that she can bring the computer out of suspend with the power button, run her drawing program with one hotkey on the keyboard, and she's into her drawing program. She loves her Dis
  • When we are a bit older we can impress our juniors by calling their PDAs "dynabooks". [honco.net]

    Grandpa! Why do you always call my PDA a "dynabook"?

    "Well sonny, long before you were born, there was a really smart guy named, Alan Kay, and he was the first person to think up a powerful, portable computer a kid could draw on, and ask questions."

    "Really? Did you know him Grandpa?"

    (chuckle) "What do you think?"

  • Around about 1975, when I was an undergraduate student at a small, private, and somewhat uptight college, Alan Kay gave an afternoon talk in one of the main auditoriums. In the middle of the presentation, seemingly unrelated to what he was talking about, he said, "Watching television is like mental masturbation." He then seemed to lose his train of thought, so the sentence just hung there for several seconds. He then continued on talking about the Dynabook or whatever like nothing had happened. 28 years la

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