Face to Face with Alan Kay: "Q: You often say that the computer revolution hasn't happened yet. What do you mean by that?
A: If you look with a squinty eye at most of personal computing today, you'll see we're basically just automating paper—using digital versions of documents and mail. But as was the case with the invention of the printing press, the interesting thing about the computer is that it allows you to have new ways of representing things, new ways to argue about things, and new kinds of fluencies.


Most schools define computer literacy as being able to operate Microsoft Office and maybe do a little web design. They're missing the point. That's like saying, 'If you know which end of a book to hold up, and you know how to turn to Chapter Three, then you're literate.'


Literature is first and foremost about having ideas important enough to discuss and write down in some form. So you have to ask, 'What is the literature that is best written down on a computer?' One answer is to make a dynamic simulation of some idea that you think is important, a simulation that you can play with and that you can learn from.
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