The drive to UI simplicity deters kids from learning about how computers work

(After reading this over, this is a little more misanthropic than I'd intended... I'll post it regardless though.)

The drive to turn general-purpose computation devices into information appliances is something that I find interesting and a bit disturbing. I'm not sure that it's just a fault of streamlined UIs, though. People actively want to neuter their machines to present only what they want and are familiar with, and not a great deal else.

I'm not a Luddite, I don't believe in bashing up the machinery of the internet because it shall enslave us all. It is bewildering, though, that when given ever-better tools for learning and problem-solving, we've managed to infect everything with the same bullshit advertising and consumerism memes that plagued our parents.

Given the opportunity and mechanism for solving problems that were utterly infeasible mere decades ago, for connecting people of different walks of life across untold miles, and for storing several times over the combined sum of mankind's knowledge, a good chunk of startups appear to be either banking on advertising or data mining (for better advertising) as their core business.

Worse, our customers (read: product) flock in droves to our sites and give up their information, buy our products knowing full well our anti-competitive practices (secure boot, trusted computing, and all the rest) because they're too lazy to maintain their own systems, and cheerfully pull down any of their member that question the economic assumptions that condemn "piracy"--and we laud and encourage them!

From time to time we see folks making light of the FSF and Stallman and GNU and that whole mess. I'm basically convinced at this point that the only real mistake those neckbeards have made is making the assumption that the users are worth protecting and ensuring the freedom of.

Why are people concerned about educating the next generation of willful idiots?

I've never seen a plumber upset that not everyone they meet knows how to do basic plumbing. Chefs don't get mad that people they meet can't cook a fancy souffle. Why is it that so many programmers expect the world to understand computers?

Yes, people use computers daily. They also use telephones, cars, and projectors. They make use of cd players, mp3 players, and water fountains. Do you think that, back in the '30s, everyone who used the then-new FM radio had any idea how the hell it worked? Most people who watch movies don't know jack about how to produce, or act, or edit, or manipulate film.

Kids aren't learning about computers because most kids don't care about computers. That's just fine. Focus on those who care.

Oh, there is nothing like the smell of Luddites in the morning!(people against change mixed with fear and mixed with "those were the times...").

So I assume this person really knows how the clothes she wears are made. Of course if she wears socks or a sweater she will know knitting, or at least how to manage a sewing machine(everybody should know just the basics).

Of course she will also know how her car works and repair it when needed, if she had ever flied she will know how to pilot a plane.

Look at mee!!, I AM A GEEK! I know how to do all of the above so everybody should!!

Now you also need qualities that are not geek nature. It seems like we have to be everything, from playing good the piano and being a good lover to being the funniest at the parties and work in your job like a machine, while we are the best parents to our children and the best givers to the community.

It has to be said that we only have what the article calls social literacy - i.e. a largely correct assumption that everybody can read and write - because there are laws in place that make it so. Everybody has to learn reading and writing in school.

I don't think social computer-literacy can be achieved without making it a mandatory part of everybody's school curriculum.

So the question we have to debate is whether computer-literacy should be such a mandatory part of the curriculum. I am not completely certain on this, but my instincts tell me that the answer is Yes.

The problem is not UI simplicity, but rather the consumer monoculture of consumption destinations like facebook or even reddit. As the article points out, many young users rarely go beyond popular sites and fail to learn basic computing skills. This is a problem of users viewing the web as a new form of couch potato TV, but I would not blame simpler UI for this phenomenon.

And this is a good thing in general. Computers are tools, after all. When I drive a car, I don't need to know how internal combustion engines, transmissions, steering etc work, like it was in the early days. The same is true for computers today. Why should the user be forced to learn all the peculiarities of the system if all he needs is a way to talk to his friends on the other side of the globe? If it works, it works, and if it doesn't you call an expert.

True, you should know a bit about cars if you want to do crazy endurance races and you should know a bit about computers if you want to use their full potential, but the vast majority of the users won't ever need that.

I don't actually see the problem. The analogy between learning computer programming and learning to read and write is flawed. The written word is a tool which, to be used, requires both parties to know how to read and write. There is no way to use written media unless you know how to read. Computer programs are not like that. You don't need to know programming to use programs, and there is really no problem if most people don't know how to program. The real analogy would be programming, and knowing how to operate a printing press. You need this knowledge to produce the end product (programs and printed books), but not to use it. And that's fine, really.

We're heading towards the Idiocracy future:

http://acousticmonster.com/wp-content/gallery/wtf-files/wind...

Necessity is the mother of invention. No necessity means no invention. Right now, we're building an entire generation that will be unable to produce computer innovation because they've become complacent: they believe that facebook is the end of the computer world. That would be fine if facebook actually were the end of the computer world, but it isn't. In thirty years we'll need those people to manage sprawling databases, automate more and more complex systems, and generally bend computers to their will, and they'll be unprepared and inadequate.

Comparing computer illiteracy with analphabetism seems a little exagerated. I remember seeing this same divide between geeks and people who couldn't care less ten years ago.

And about the quote: "The kids I have, and that is roughly two dozen of the brightest young digital artists a semester, often have no idea what Microsoft Word is. They can't tell a Mac from a PC. And forget Excel," he says. He struggles to get his students to use basic computing etiquette." Maybe they should raise the bar for entrants to this course... really.

update: how can those students be the brightest digital artists if they can't even tell if they are working on a Mac or PC?

As someone said "genius" or experts are always special. Just because everybody uses a computer, it does not mean that everybody will be the next Euler.

But it does not mean either than there are not going to be more Eulers. Quite the contrary, the barriers to know for those that want it are smaller than ever. And there is people that care. They are a minority, but they are there.

The worst thing you could do is to try to force it to all, as what was a pleasure becomes a sin as Feynman realized.

When I was younger between the ages of 9-15 I loved hardware hacking. I would take apart Xboxes, Play Stations and even my computers. I would install mod chips, homebrew software and even tacky lighting. Being apart of the hardcore gaming community (CS, Team Fortress, WoW) almost instilled the notion of modding your 'rig'. People would overclock and and liquid cool their PCs which is hardcore stuff. I feel like there are two things that have led to a decrease in the hardware hacking environment (which I feel is parallel to the author's point).

1.Manufacturers began to 'get it'. Computers began to look cool, no more beige boxes and lame looking side panels. With the birth of Aleinware, the Dell XPS and Falcon Northwest came a huge blow to the modding community. Instead of spending days modding your PC to make it look cool and perform well, you could buy one out of the box (sometimes even overclocked)! This started to eat away at the modding culture. Even console makers stepped their game up in terms of connectivity. They began to provide more codecs for video playback which was one of the main reasons to mod a console- to allow video playback.

2. Another thing happened which pulled me and others away from the modding/hacking community- I bought a Mac. Ever since I moved into the Apple ecosystem I haven't opened up a piece of hardware. I bought my first Macbook when I was 16 and loved it. It worked, it did everything I needed it to. I moved more into the less horsepower social game landscape where I didn't need the heavy duty processing power. Once I was in the Apple ecosystem I didn't need a home NAS server running with my torrents, I began buying my music, movies and TV shows. This content then streamed on my devices (Apple TV and mobile) perfectly. It required no hacking to work, it all came together effortlessly. I feel like this is happening to a lot of hackers. I deep down feel Apple has made people complacent with current technology and has really created a lack of need to hack your hardware and software.

This begs a question, has the paradigm shifted from enthusiasts pushing the envelope with hardware and software to the technology companies?

Not everyone needs to know how computers work. There will always be some who do, and most who don't. That's the way it has been and the way it probably always will be.

The objective of simplifying the UI is to reduce as much as possible what a user has to learn. The thinking is that the less a user has to learn, the more a user gets to do and as a result the greater satisfaction gained by the user. Satisfied users are good for sales, so UIs have been getting simpler to generate more money.

It's no surprise that UI simplicity deters kids from learning about how computers work, since UI simplicity is supposed to deter learning, or eliminate the need to learn as much as possible.

I wonder if this same argument was made when computers first had mouses and GUIs introduced...

It's a silly, pointless argument. Absolutely without merit.

So you build tools that attempt to make it easier to make mobile apps (PhoneGap, Trigger, Titanium etc) and the geeks cry "use native code!".

I'm looking forward to the day where we can build any website/app/program/idea by simply having a conversation with our computers (or the cloud). 12 year-old: "I want a mobile app that finds my friends on Facebook nearby", comp: "Sure, how's this?", 12yo: "Cool, I want to be able to post a message to all nearby friends", comp: "Here you go. Do you want it to send an SMS or a push notification or?"...etc...

As much as 98% of HN will hate this concept, the faster coding can become more modularized and easy enough for the mainstream to build whatever idea comes to mind, the better off society will be and the faster humanity will progress.