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CMU Professor Randy Pausch's 'Last Lecture'

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the worth-your-time dept.

This is a bit of an unusual story for Slashdot- it's the "Last Lecture" of a professor at CMU who is terminally ill. His early research in VR has benefited everyone and even if you have never heard of Randy Pausch I think this is worth your time. It's a 2 hour long wmv filled with insight, laughs and wisdom from a man who has really done some amazing work. I've been watching it all morning and I think it would really be worth your time if you can spare it to listen to what he has to say. From virtual reality to education to stuffed animals and childhood dreams, there's a lot here worth your time. Thanks drew for the link. Update: 09/21 15:44 GMT by Z : The link is already a little shakey, so you might want to turn to this cut up YouTube version of the talk instead.

9 of 93 comments (clear)

  1. Moving.. by kraemate · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I havent seen the lecture, but the story in some Pittsburgh newspaper (sorry, dont have the link - it appeared on reddit yesterday) is really moving. Amazing, so 'close' to death but still in such good spirits. Sad that i came to know of such a great spirit when i know i wont be hearing more from/about him. Sad indeed.

  2. Slashdot stories by flynt · · Score: 5, Insightful

    This is actually the type of story I love to see on Slashdot. A nice break from yet another "YRO" stuff.

  3. Sad that youtube forces this stuff to be cut up by antifoidulus · · Score: 3, Insightful

    because they are worried that anything over 10 minutes is probably a copyright violation....they should at least create some mechanism whereby material that provably doesn't violate copyrights could have more than 10 minutes alloted to it....how you would prove it is another issue entirely, but I would imagine they could implement some type of peer review system.

    --
    Monstar L
    1. Re:Sad that youtube forces this stuff to be cut up by kebes · · Score: 2, Insightful

      they should at least create some mechanism whereby material that provably doesn't violate copyrights could have more than 10 minutes alloted to it....
      YouTube evidently is able to serve up videos past the 10-minute limit. The official Google channel and the Google Talks channel have plenty of long videos. So, at least for those trusted channels the limit doesn't exist. I'm not sure if there is any way to get YouTube to trust your channel.

      how you would prove it is another issue entirely, but I would imagine they could implement some type of peer review system.
      Frankly the 10-minute limit is a small impediment to copyright infringement. People just split the work into multiple pieces (numbered "1/9" to "9/9" or whatever), and it's quite easy for a YouTube viewer to simply queue up all the pieces to play one after the other. So, really, what's the point of the 10-minute restriction?

      One thing I can say is that community flagging isn't the answer. You can currently flag content on YouTube, but the fact is that a large portion of the community wants the copyrighted content on YouTube, and thus won't actively participate in flagging it as infringing (or conversely will actively flag infringing content as "okay")... not to speak of the fact that the viewer has no way of knowing whether permission was given for a particular posting. Some TV shows have YouTube channels where they post material, but how is a viewer supposed to tell the difference between sanctioned channels and unsanctioned ones?
  4. Amazing Lecture - Dare to Dream by NiMSiM · · Score: 5, Insightful

    It was an amazing lecture. If you dare to dream and dare to follow through, then he's the man to emulate.

  5. Re:He made an impact on my life. by viega · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Haha, me too (I was one of Randy's students back when he was at UVa). I didn't get too into Doom, but when the Quake test code came out, many of us spent pretty much every waking hour playing, for several months. In the meantime, we were supposed to be working on an Alice deliverable for SIGGRAPH. I think the turning point for my entire life was a few months before SIGGRAPH, when Randy called a couple of us out for being too much play and not enough work. I went cold turkey, and didn't pick up another video game for 10 years. I firmly believe if he hadn't done that, I'd have accomplished very little professionally, and would be holding down a crappy 9-5 mid-level programming job while thinking forward to what I was going to play on my XBox 360 on any given night. To this day, I can't really get much enjoyment out of a video game, but I think that's a good thing! Randy definitely taught me to pick a prize and keep my eye on it. He used to like to tell me, "John, you're a strong rocket with no fins," that I would never get to the moon and would come crashing back to earth if I didn't focus. I didn't like it at the time, but I needed to hear it. I think about that advice all the time, and it is just as relevant to me today. Randy has always attracted amazing talent and amazing people. The people in that lab were the greatest group of people I ever worked with in many respects. I'm proud they're my friends, and I'm thankful to Randy for providing the environment and putting us together.

  6. What can one say... by blind+biker · · Score: 4, Insightful

    This was the most valuable lecture I've ever attended. And it's the kind of lecture I can talk about with my girlfriend, with my friends, and with anyone I care about. It's the stuff of life.

    This man has lived an amazing life, and no doubt, this gives him the courage and the peace of mind to leave in such a graceful way, in an ultimate act of generosity. "Take a piece of me" he said somewhere at the beginning, when inviting people in the audience to take away his stuffed animals. And I feel I received a piece of him, even though I am thousands of kilometers away from this great person.

    If you want your children to persevere in their lives and reach their dreams, show them this lecture (I saw the videos on YouTube), and talk about it with them.

    --
    "The agriculture ministry is not in charge of Gundam" - Japanese ministry official.
  7. best teacher I ever had by cknudsen · · Score: 2, Insightful

    I had Randy Pausch for an undergrad CS class at UVA in either 88 or 89.... so that was either his first or second year teaching there. Without a doubt, he was the best teacher I had in all four years. I can only imagine that he got even better after almost 20 years of practice. He truly engaged the students. I've been in the software business for 17 years now, and I continue to enjoy it today. I have to think he's partly the reason I ended up there (since I was in the EE program).

    --
    http://www.k5n.us
  8. This guy is amazing. Reminds me of. . . by Fantastic+Lad · · Score: 2, Insightful
    I just watched the video via youtube, and was happily impressed. Randy carries his light and encourages others to do so, and thus makes ripples which go on to affect the world in very positive ways. He reminds me of Joseph Campbell ("Follow your Bliss") and Ray Bradbury ("Live on the edge of your hysteria") in this regard.

    Those two gents made a huge impact upon me when I was growing through high school, and all I had access to were a few recordings and videos of them speaking, but the philosophies they broadcast were powerful enough to change me forever.

    Teachers of this caliber are golden.

    The very best thing you can do for the world is to Live Your Light. --Just doing so and encouraging others to do so changes the world in ways which are not immediately obvious, but it is enough to win the war against the dark side.


    -FL