The remark about a touchscreen amused me, since this is essentially a lo-res touchscreen. You can have a super high resolution full color touchscreen for small moneys, but if you want it to be super low res and monochrome you have to pay big moneys and you also have to design and assemble it yourself! In a way this is obvious, but it's also kind of bananas: you can only easily do things that are popular. Then again I suppose there'd be no project if it was easy.
I can't put my finger on it, but there's something very satisfying about seeing his final build, that I think wouldn't be there if it were a touch screen.
never underestimate physicality over screens. Look at the backlash to 'big ipad' car dashboards.
If it was a touchscreen, then the whole project could just be replaced by googling Conway’s game of life on an iPad. The physicality is the point.