[sudo-discuss] about the future (Alan Kay)

[Ryan Bethencourt]

This looks awesome thanks J!


On Wed, Apr 3, 2013 at 7:41 PM, J Clark <LitSL at manymedia.com> wrote:

> Wondered if some sudoers might be interested in this video, with
> awesome-smart guy Alan Kay and Vishal Sikka of SAP, hosted by futurist guy
> Paul Saffo.
>
> 3.26.13 Technology and Transformation: Vishal Sikka and Alan Kay in
> Conversation with Paul Saffo
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IPsZyfGCaKs
>
> Ah, tropes, memes, symbols, and change. hurrah!
>
> Also on the Alan Kay theme, a written interview:
>
> An Interview with Computing Pioneer Alan Kay
> By David Greelish
> April 02 2013
> <
> http://techland.time.com/2013/04/02/an-interview-with-computing-pioneer-alan-kay/
> >
>
> Born in 1940, computer scientist Alan Curtis Kay is one of a handful of
> visionaries most responsible for the concepts which have propelled personal
> computing forward over the past thirty years — and surely the most quotable
> one.
>
> He’s the man who said that “The best way to predict the future is to
> invent it” and that “Technology is anything that wasn’t around when you
> were born” and that “If you don’t fail at least 90 percent of the time,
> you’re not aiming high enough.” And when I first saw Microsoft‘s Surface
> tablet last June, a Kay maxim helped me understand it: “People who are
> really serious about software should make their own hardware.”
>
> Above all, however, Kay is known for the Dynabook — his decades-old vision
> of a portable suite of hardware, software, programming tools and services
> which would add up to the ultimate creative environment for kids of all
> ages. Every modern portable computer reflects elements of the Dynabook
> concept — the One Laptop Per Child project’s XO above all others — and yet
> none of them have fully realized the concept which Kay was writing about in
> the early 1970s.
>
> Actually, Kay says that some gadgets with superficial Dynabook-like
> qualities, such as the iPad, have not only failed to realize the Dynabook
> dream, but have in some senses betrayed it. That’s one of the points he
> makes in this interview, conducted by computer historian David Greelish,
> proprietor of the Classic Computing Blog and organizer of this month’s
> Vintage Computer Festival Southeast in Atlanta. (The Festival will feature
> a pop-up Apple museum featuring Xerox’s groundbreaking Alto workstation,
> which Kay worked on, as well as devices which deeply reflected his
> influence, including the Lisa, the original Macintosh and the Newton.)
>
> Kay and Greelish also discuss Kay’s experiences at some of the big outfits
> where he’s worked, including Xerox’s fabled PARC labs, Apple, Disney and
> HP. Today, Kay continues his research about children and technology at his
> own organization, the Viewpoints Research Institute.
>
> –Harry McCracken
>
> David Greelish: Do you agree that we now essentially have the Dynabook, as
> expressed in the three tiers of modern personal computing; the notebook,
> tablet and smartphone? If not, what critical features do you see missing
> from these? Have they delivered on the promise of improving education?
>
> Alan Kay: I have been asked versions of this question for the last twenty
> years or so. Ninety-five percent of the Dynabook idea was a “service
> conception,” and five percent had to do with physical forms, of which only
> one — the slim notebook — is generally in the public view. (The other two
> were an extrapolated version of Ivan Sutherland’s head mounted display, and
> an extrapolated version of Nicholas Negroponte’s ideas about ubiquitous
> computers embedded and networked everywhere.)
>
> [snip]
>
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>


-- 
Ryan Bethencourt

Tel: (415) 794 6463
ryan.bethencourt at gmail.com

www.bamh1.com
www.linkedin.com/in/bethencourt
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