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The future is not laid out on a track. It is something that we can decide.

Alan Kay

So at the end of the presentation, Steve came up to me and said: Is the iPhone worth criticizing? And I said: Make the screen five inches by eight inches, and you’ll rule the world.
ALAN KAY

Eight End Five Inch iPhone Presentation ule World
This is not secret knowledge. It’s just secret to this pop culture.
ALAN KAY

Culture Knowledge Pop Secret
A change in perspective is worth 80 IQ points. Perspective is worth 80 IQ points. Point of view is worth 80 IQ points
ALAN KAY

Change Eighty Perspective Point Worth
The protean nature of the computer is such that it can act like a machine or like a language to be shaped and exploited.
ALAN KAY

Act Computer Exploit Language Like Machine Nature Protean Shape Such
This tends to result in very dumbed-down products that are easy to get started on, but are generally worthless and/or debilitating.
ALAN KAY

Debilitation Dumb Easy General Product Result Tend Worthless
It’s all about long-term, sustaining relationships.
ALAN KAY

Long Relationship Sustained Term
I knew in the first grade that they were lying to me because I had already been exposed to other points of view.
ALAN KAY

Already Behaviour Expose First Grade Point Try View
I fear – as far as I can tell – that most undergraduate degrees in computer science these days are basically Java vocational training.
ALAN KAY

Basically Computer Degree Far Fear Java Most Science Tell Training Undergraduate Vocational
Understanding- -like civilization, happiness, music, science and a host of other great endeavors–is not a state of being, but a manner of traveling.
ALAN KAY

Civilization Endeavour Host Manner Science Stae Traveling Understanding
Bad User on Device is a medium that can dynamically simulate the details of any other medium, including media that cannot exist physically.
ALAN KAY

Any Bad Detail Device Dynamical Medium Other Simulate User
Technology is anything invented after you were born, everything else is just stuff.
ALAN KAY

After Anything Born Invent Technology
[Computing] is just a fabulous place for that, because it’s a place where you don’t have to be a Ph.D. or anything else. It’s a place where you can still be an artisan.
ALAN KAY

Anything Artisan Computer Else Fabulous Just Place
But Basic happened to be on a GE timesharing system that was done by Dartmouth, and when GE decided to franchise that, it started spreading Basic around just because it was there, not because it had any intrinsic merits whatsoever.
ALAN KAY

Around Basic Decide Done Franchise Happen Spread Timeshare
Basic would never have surfaced because there was always a language better than Basic for that purpose.
ALAN KAY

Always Basic Better Language Purpose Surface
Lisp isn’t a language, it’s a building material.
ALAN KAY

Buil Language Lips Material
Some people worry that artificial intelligence will make us feel inferior, but then, anybody in his right mind should have an inferiority complex every time he looks at a flower.
ALAN KAY

Artificial Feel Inferior Intelligence Some People Worry

The future is not laid out on a track. It is something that we can decide.

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The future is not laid out on a track. It is something that we can decide.

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