Big surprise. I mean, the rumored suggested price for windows running on those things would have been $3 a pop? Right. It would have been a scaled down version of CE. linux would run better on blender than any windows on a $100 laptop.
oh man, you are absolutely right, as a product of that particular type of structured "math" program, I was the geek. I was good at math and totally dug my big ass calculator. My friend and I, oh yeah, the only ones NOT putting games on, but trying to figure out how to make calculating the pythagorean theorem, or quadratic equation easier. Certainly not genius level stuff, but had to figure it out, trial and error type stuff with really simple arguments and commands. However, my graduating class was about 350 students, and I guarantee, that my friend and I were the only people doing worthwile things with our calculators... well besides trying to download asteroids. come on, that's just cool.
Being a 21 year old and working instead of going to college, I would have to say the draw to programming is somewhat diminished since before my day to even started... but just barely. The kids that I knew and grew up with, some of their first computers were the mac classics and lc II's. If I may claim that this comment would represent 80+% of my graduating class starting in the 6th grade, if it didn't have a mouse, I wasn't using it.
So I think kids ARE programming less because of 3 main things.
1. They grew up in a time the most programming they ever had to know was how change a directory in DOS to play a pinball game.
2. Macs were common place among myself and my geeky friends(yes we can use the definition from the article). And last but not least,
3. Instant gratification. Between cable, DSL, Tivo's, and windows 95 being the most popular operating system in my home town. We didn't have the commodore 64 to go and play around with and see what we could do, we had nintendos and sega genesis. Needless to say, we thought we were putting our minds to greater use than that Gates guy anyway.
Speaking from personal experience, I don't know anyone in my cohort that started using a computer before the 6th grade, and 6th grade for me was 1996-1997. That's right, the... eh hem... time of Windows 95. (DOS knowledge, not required, but preferred;) [from what I remember])
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Big surprise. I mean, the rumored suggested price for windows running on those things would have been $3 a pop? Right. It would have been a scaled down version of CE. linux would run better on blender than any windows on a $100 laptop.
oh man, you are absolutely right, as a product of that particular type of structured "math" program, I was the geek. I was good at math and totally dug my big ass calculator. My friend and I, oh yeah, the only ones NOT putting games on, but trying to figure out how to make calculating the pythagorean theorem, or quadratic equation easier. Certainly not genius level stuff, but had to figure it out, trial and error type stuff with really simple arguments and commands. However, my graduating class was about 350 students, and I guarantee, that my friend and I were the only people doing worthwile things with our calculators... well besides trying to download asteroids. come on, that's just cool.
Being a 21 year old and working instead of going to college, I would have to say the draw to programming is somewhat diminished since before my day to even started... but just barely. The kids that I knew and grew up with, some of their first computers were the mac classics and lc II's. If I may claim that this comment would represent 80+% of my graduating class starting in the 6th grade, if it didn't have a mouse, I wasn't using it. So I think kids ARE programming less because of 3 main things. 1. They grew up in a time the most programming they ever had to know was how change a directory in DOS to play a pinball game. 2. Macs were common place among myself and my geeky friends(yes we can use the definition from the article). And last but not least, 3. Instant gratification. Between cable, DSL, Tivo's, and windows 95 being the most popular operating system in my home town. We didn't have the commodore 64 to go and play around with and see what we could do, we had nintendos and sega genesis. Needless to say, we thought we were putting our minds to greater use than that Gates guy anyway. Speaking from personal experience, I don't know anyone in my cohort that started using a computer before the 6th grade, and 6th grade for me was 1996-1997. That's right, the... eh hem... time of Windows 95. (DOS knowledge, not required, but preferred ;) [from what I remember])