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I think we can expect to see something interesting in the next couple decades, in that the stereotype of the 'Hacker' will completely disappear. When ALL kids

I think we can expect to see something interesting in the next couple decades, in that the stereotype of the 'Hacker' will completely disappear. When ALL kids are exposed to technology at the very beginning, I think computer programming will become increasingly mainstream. I think the end result will be a lot more 'hackers' who are actually a lot better. I also think this will result in a boom of Open Source, as 'scratching his/her own itch' will jump from version control/web browsing to a much larger variety of things.

wallflower 17y ago
> When ALL kids are exposed to technology at the very beginning, I think computer programming will become increasingly mainstream. "I’ve been working on an education project, which is another place where, again, there’s tremendous potential for Google to do stuff. What we're working on, having passed the gauntlet of Google’s trademark lawyers, is called App Inventor for Android, and the idea is to make it easy for beginning computer science students, non-computer science students, maybe eventually high school students, to build mobile apps. Right now we are thinking about where this project wants to go when it grows up. Even where it wants to go come 2010. There’s a range, from focusing it more on education, to focusing it more broadly – i.e. making it so anybody can easily make Android apps." -Professor Hal Abelson of MIT http://research.google.com/university/relations/visiting-faculty/professor-hal-abelson.html http://research.google.com/university/relations/visiting-fac...
nostrademons 17y ago
I worry a little that the inability to focus will negate a lot of that fluency with technology. Every major technical innovation took a long period of focused, dedicated work to come to fruition. Woz worked on the Apple I for a year before it was ready, Larry and Sergey worked on Google for 3 years before it became a company. That seems like an eternity when you're used to getting feedback within 10 seconds of typing something in. We saw a lot of this in the Web 2.0 boom of 2005-2007. Lots and lots of people started companies because they were fluent with the technology - but most of those companies were simply "me too" copies of the latest fad, because that's all you can do in the 3-month timescales that were being promoted for new startups. Real innovation happens over much longer timescales, as you take what you've learned, discard the bad parts, build on the good parts, and finally come out with something the world has never seen before. Heck, I've got a compiler sitting in one of my background windows that I've been working on, on and off, for 3 years, with little progress. Because it's in the background. Instead, I'm posting on Hacker News, where I can expect a response in an hour or two. And if you're responding - don't you have a big hairy audacious project that you could be working on but aren't?
makmanalp 17y ago
I think that's far too optimistic. Using technology is not the same as making / hacking it. Far too many people don't care.
- wallflower 17y ago
  True. I see people everyday on the train, using their mobile devices to fritter away time. They're consumers of technology, not producers. However, the ongoing democratization of technology(1) will make it easier to make. Or at least for them to share something. Or at least for non-technical people to do the stuff that they want. My brother-in-law had a PC for years. He got a MacBook and suddenly he was making DVDs, slideshows, editing video. Was it just the technology or was it the fact that Apple makes it easy to do things most people would like to do be able to do with their computers (the iLife software)? Why do you think YouTube became so successful? They took a really hard problem (how to allow people to upload and share a video and made it easy). "Over the span of one week two million people downloaded [Tap Tap Revenge] to their iPhone or iPod Touch devices. Something has changed. It has changed for good. Has it changed for the better? I’m not yet sure – but I am sure there’s no going back." http://kickingbear.com/blog/archives/67 http://kickingbear.com/blog/archives/67 (1) This essay by one of the coders behind Tap Tap Revenge that was posted yesterday on HN (but kinda got buried) goes more into the democratization of technology, wherein the people don't care about big software, they want Pop Software, they want to do cool stuff with their mobile devices.
- alexgartrell 17y ago
  I think what you're overlooking is the LOADS of kids that go off and become Mechanical Engineers, Civil Engineers, and mathematicians. Lots of people care about developing solutions to hard problems, but they just aren't exposed to technology in the same way as most of us were. I think that this is changing.
Skriticos 17y ago
No amount of technocracy will change how people solve problems. The are basically two ways: 1. Apply predefined solutions to solve a problem (i.e. Use gadgets and applications someone else programmed). 2. Develop a custom solution to a problem (i.e. Put together your own program that solves your problem). Arguably the next generation will learn to apply more complex predefined solutions to problems, but they won't magically start to migrate to the second mindset.

wallflower 17y ago

> When ALL kids are exposed to technology at the very beginning, I think computer programming will become increasingly mainstream. "I’ve been working on an education project, which is another place where, again, there’s tremendous potential for Google to do stuff. What we're working on, having passed the gauntlet of Google’s trademark lawyers, is called App Inventor for Android, and the idea is to make it easy for beginning computer science students, non-computer science students, maybe eventually high school students, to build mobile apps. Right now we are thinking about where this project wants to go when it grows up. Even where it wants to go come 2010. There’s a range, from focusing it more on education, to focusing it more broadly – i.e. making it so anybody can easily make Android apps." -Professor Hal Abelson of MIT http://research.google.com/university/relations/visiting-faculty/professor-hal-abelson.html http://research.google.com/university/relations/visiting-fac...

nostrademons 17y ago

I worry a little that the inability to focus will negate a lot of that fluency with technology. Every major technical innovation took a long period of focused, dedicated work to come to fruition. Woz worked on the Apple I for a year before it was ready, Larry and Sergey worked on Google for 3 years before it became a company. That seems like an eternity when you're used to getting feedback within 10 seconds of typing something in. We saw a lot of this in the Web 2.0 boom of 2005-2007. Lots and lots of people started companies because they were fluent with the technology - but most of those companies were simply "me too" copies of the latest fad, because that's all you can do in the 3-month timescales that were being promoted for new startups. Real innovation happens over much longer timescales, as you take what you've learned, discard the bad parts, build on the good parts, and finally come out with something the world has never seen before. Heck, I've got a compiler sitting in one of my background windows that I've been working on, on and off, for 3 years, with little progress. Because it's in the background. Instead, I'm posting on Hacker News, where I can expect a response in an hour or two. And if you're responding - don't you have a big hairy audacious project that you could be working on but aren't?

makmanalp 17y ago

I think that's far too optimistic. Using technology is not the same as making / hacking it. Far too many people don't care.

wallflower 17y ago
True. I see people everyday on the train, using their mobile devices to fritter away time. They're consumers of technology, not producers. However, the ongoing democratization of technology(1) will make it easier to make. Or at least for them to share something. Or at least for non-technical people to do the stuff that they want. My brother-in-law had a PC for years. He got a MacBook and suddenly he was making DVDs, slideshows, editing video. Was it just the technology or was it the fact that Apple makes it easy to do things most people would like to do be able to do with their computers (the iLife software)? Why do you think YouTube became so successful? They took a really hard problem (how to allow people to upload and share a video and made it easy). "Over the span of one week two million people downloaded [Tap Tap Revenge] to their iPhone or iPod Touch devices. Something has changed. It has changed for good. Has it changed for the better? I’m not yet sure – but I am sure there’s no going back." http://kickingbear.com/blog/archives/67 http://kickingbear.com/blog/archives/67 (1) This essay by one of the coders behind Tap Tap Revenge that was posted yesterday on HN (but kinda got buried) goes more into the democratization of technology, wherein the people don't care about big software, they want Pop Software, they want to do cool stuff with their mobile devices.
alexgartrell 17y ago
I think what you're overlooking is the LOADS of kids that go off and become Mechanical Engineers, Civil Engineers, and mathematicians. Lots of people care about developing solutions to hard problems, but they just aren't exposed to technology in the same way as most of us were. I think that this is changing.

Skriticos 17y ago

No amount of technocracy will change how people solve problems. The are basically two ways: 1. Apply predefined solutions to solve a problem (i.e. Use gadgets and applications someone else programmed). 2. Develop a custom solution to a problem (i.e. Put together your own program that solves your problem). Arguably the next generation will learn to apply more complex predefined solutions to problems, but they won't magically start to migrate to the second mindset.