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Bret Victor is the modern day equivalent of Alan Kay. Hopefully in a decade we will see the fruits of his ideas everywhere in tomorrow's software and machines.

by kanobo 6y ago

codemonkey-zeta 6y ago
Bret is one of those presenters that makes you feel simultaneously enlightened and incredibly stupid for not seeing things so obviously how they are. I've read (and watched) that Richard Feynman had that same quality, and I agree that Alan Kay shares the same.
germinalphrase 6y ago
Maybe. I find his talks fascinating and energizing (he’s clearly a sharper guy than me), but Dynamicland feels like the ornithopter of ubiquitous computing. It will be cool, clever and instructive - but why mess around with all that paper and dots when AR will do that and more?
- kanobo 6y ago
  I didn't mean to suggest Bret's projects and his output will literally manifest as-is in the future. I don't want paper dots or 80's style dynabooks in my living room. My intention was to say that I hope his ideas are catalysts for the next generation's innovators like Alan Kay's ideas were.
  - germinalphrase 6y ago
    Absolutely. I’m entirely with you on that sentiment .
  - megameter 6y ago
    My main criticism of Victor is that his software demos overshadow the concepts. They're extremely flashy and don't recenter the main thesis. And the concepts themselves are more like popularizations of the Engelbart-Kay dialectic than an original perspective. Despite that, I reference his talks fairly often, so I guess this is a case of "Thanks, I hate it."
filoeleven 6y ago
In fact they have worked together on Dynamicland, where the building is the computer. I always check into that again whenever Bret Victor comes up. It moves slowly, so I was excited to see this in their timeline: > 2022: Dynamicland meets the world, in the form of new kinds of libraries, museums, classrooms, science labs, arts venues, and businesses. We will empower these communities to build what they need for themselves, to design their own futures. https://dynamicland.org/ https://dynamicland.org/
wes-k 6y ago
Been working on bringing his drawing dynamic visualizations* to life! I saw the demo like 6 years ago and have been itching to build it. Finally started on it last year and am pretty excited about the possibilities. Don't have much to show a.t.m except for an old animation I made a while ago when developing the engine: https://imgur.com/a/ELhwWo5 https://imgur.com/a/ELhwWo5 * https://vimeo.com/66085662 https://vimeo.com/66085662
xixixao 6y ago
Bret has spurred a following. My little contribution[0], Aurora, Lighttable. I'm afraid that wave has mostly died down (do comment if you think otherwise). Instead after 7 years we're converging on VS Code, a mostly traditional IDE "done right", and super pragmatic, but conventional languages (Typescript for high level, Rust for performance). [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HnZipJOan54 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HnZipJOan54

Bret Victor is the modern day equivalent of Alan Kay. Hopefully in a decade we will see the fruits of his ideas everywhere in tomorrow's software and machines.

by kanobo 6y ago

Bret Victor is the modern day equivalent of Alan Kay. Hopefully in a decade we will see the fruits of his ideas everywhere in tomorrow's software and machines.

codemonkey-zeta 6y ago

Bret is one of those presenters that makes you feel simultaneously enlightened and incredibly stupid for not seeing things so obviously how they are. I've read (and watched) that Richard Feynman had that same quality, and I agree that Alan Kay shares the same.

germinalphrase 6y ago

Maybe. I find his talks fascinating and energizing (he’s clearly a sharper guy than me), but Dynamicland feels like the ornithopter of ubiquitous computing. It will be cool, clever and instructive - but why mess around with all that paper and dots when AR will do that and more?

kanobo 6y ago
I didn't mean to suggest Bret's projects and his output will literally manifest as-is in the future. I don't want paper dots or 80's style dynabooks in my living room. My intention was to say that I hope his ideas are catalysts for the next generation's innovators like Alan Kay's ideas were.
- germinalphrase 6y ago
  Absolutely. I’m entirely with you on that sentiment .
- megameter 6y ago
  My main criticism of Victor is that his software demos overshadow the concepts. They're extremely flashy and don't recenter the main thesis. And the concepts themselves are more like popularizations of the Engelbart-Kay dialectic than an original perspective. Despite that, I reference his talks fairly often, so I guess this is a case of "Thanks, I hate it."

filoeleven 6y ago

In fact they have worked together on Dynamicland, where the building is the computer. I always check into that again whenever Bret Victor comes up. It moves slowly, so I was excited to see this in their timeline: > 2022: Dynamicland meets the world, in the form of new kinds of libraries, museums, classrooms, science labs, arts venues, and businesses. We will empower these communities to build what they need for themselves, to design their own futures. https://dynamicland.org/ https://dynamicland.org/

wes-k 6y ago

Been working on bringing his drawing dynamic visualizations* to life! I saw the demo like 6 years ago and have been itching to build it. Finally started on it last year and am pretty excited about the possibilities. Don't have much to show a.t.m except for an old animation I made a while ago when developing the engine: https://imgur.com/a/ELhwWo5 https://imgur.com/a/ELhwWo5 * https://vimeo.com/66085662 https://vimeo.com/66085662

xixixao 6y ago

Bret has spurred a following. My little contribution[0], Aurora, Lighttable. I'm afraid that wave has mostly died down (do comment if you think otherwise). Instead after 7 years we're converging on VS Code, a mostly traditional IDE "done right", and super pragmatic, but conventional languages (Typescript for high level, Rust for performance). [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HnZipJOan54 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HnZipJOan54