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Quite a few people have to believe something is normal before it becomes normal – a sort of ‘voting’ situation.

Alan Kay

Bad criticism drives good criticism out of circulation. You just can’t criticize anything.
ALAN KAY

Anything Bad Criticism Good Out
I had the fortune or misfortune to learn how to read fluently starting at the age of three.
ALAN KAY

Age Fluent Fortune Learn Misfortune Read Start Three
If you’re not failing 90% of the time, then you’re probably not working on sufficiently challenging problems.
ALAN KAY

Challenge Fall Probably Problem Sufficient Time Work
The Web, in comparison, is a joke. The Web was done by amateurs.
ALAN KAY

Amateur Comparison Joke Web
Possibly the only real object-oriented system in working order. (About Internet)
ALAN KAY

Internet Object Only Order Oriented Possible Raed Subject System Work
And when they decided to beef up their OSs, they went to (different) very old bad mainframe models of OS design to try to adapt to personal computers.
ALAN KAY

Adapt Bad Beef Computer Different Mainframe Model Model Decide Old Personal Try Went
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
The idea that hardware on networks should just be caches for movable process descriptions and the processes themselves goes back quite a ways.
ALAN KAY

Back Catch Description Hardware Idea Movable Network Process Quiet
Art also has this element. Our job is to remind us that there are more contexts than the one that we’re in – the one that we think is reality.
ALAN KAY

Context Element Job More One Really Remind Think
People are willing to pay you if you’re any good at all, and you have plenty of time for screwing around.
ALAN KAY

Anything Else Fabulous People Place Where Will
School is basically about one point of view – the one the teacher has or the textbooks have.
ALAN KAY

Basically One Point School Teacher Textbook View
Java and C++ make you think that the new ideas are like the old ones.
ALAN KAY

Idea Java Make New Old One Think
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
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
I realized that my usual approach is usually critical. That is, a lot of the things that I do, that most people do, are because they hate something somebody else has done, or they hate that something hasn’t been done.
ALAN KAY

Approach Done Hate Most People Realize Someone Something Usually
I’ve heard complaints from even mighty Stanford University with its illustrious faculty that basically the undergraduate computer science program is little more than Java certification.
ALAN KAY

Certification Complain Heard Illustrious Java Program Science Undergraduate University

Quite a few people have to believe something is normal before it becomes normal – a sort of ‘voting’ situation.

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Quite a few people have to believe something is normal before it becomes normal – a sort of ‘voting’ situation.

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Popular Authors

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