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Could we please try to follow the guidelines and not have flamewars and partisan dispute? Especially ones that seem to spring up out of nowhere, reviving conversations that are months old? I'm here to learn about cool new projects; if I want to read about politics or personal drama I have pretty much the entire rest of the Internet to do so.
His evidence-free Nazi-salute-defending arguments were in such bad faith, ignoring and refusing to address other people's valid counter arguments, the exact same way he is now ignoring and refusing to engage with mine, and sealioning questions whose very premises so wrong they don't deserve the answers I gave him anyway, that his old dead boot licking comments don't deserved to be linked or repeated, since they're a distraction from the useful things I actually linked to. The only thing his comments prove is that he's not arguing in good faith, and can only dispense drive-by evidence-free attacks.
You can easily find them yourself if you really don't believe me, but it's a waste of your time, because his comments have no value. Have you looked at any of those valuable links I did post yet, or did you just get stuck in the worthless rabbithole of his posting history?
I believe your time would be much better spent reading the links I already provided than his Musk cheerleading and oligarch water carrying and Nazi salute whitewashing. But if you really care about his arguments, why don't you ask him now to explain what he said about Musk, privately? Or doesn't he publish under his own name with his own email address so you can ask him, like I do?
I'm more than happy to answer your personal email about my own arguments and projects, and continue this discussion in private: don@donhopkins.com
His own ungrounded vitriolic words attacking Jens Mönig's and Brian Harvey's and Seymour Papert's life work like "it's because this is BS and just a toy, it's got no connection to the real world" and "like almost as if the ecosystem simply serves to show off Snap and thus misses the mark" are dismissive, insulting, and provably wrong.
So I posted several links and evidence refuting him and defending my friends. Yet then he repeated the same pattern as his full throated defense of Musk's Nazi salutes, by ignoring all the evidence, and reiterating his unsubstantiated false accusations, without providing any objective evidence or coherent arguments or even any citations himself.
If you'd like to learn about cool free open source educational projects, please look at the many links I already posted, and what I posted to the Logo discussion. At least spend as much time on those interesting relevent links as you already have wasted reading his uninteresing irrelevent posting history, please.
He didn't post any links or evidence or even coherent arguments to support his mistaken and aggressive accusations, while I refuted "this is BS" by linking to and quoting the Wikipedia page about Seymour Papert's Constructionist Education philosophy, "just a toy" by naming and linking to many Snap! projects and demos, and "no connection to the real world" by citing several physical real world connections like TurtleStitch.
Yet he dismissed and ignored all of that, and questioned the motives of sincere professional educators and developers of free open source software as merely and illegitimately promoting Snap!, because he isn't arguing in good faith, just attacking, and he didn't bother looking at any of the links, so he still doesn't know what he's talking about.
If reading his oligarch-syncophantic posting history (which I was trying to save you from by identifying where he's actually coming from) isn't interesting enough for you, and you still thirst to learn about cool projects, then please look at the links I already posted, read my other recent posts about Logo, and check out some of the other educational projects I've been developing over several decades, which were deeply inspired by Seymour Papert's Constructionism, that I've written a lot about.
But if like him you're so offput and triggered by the very mention of diversity, constructionist education, free speech for anyone but Musk, and criticism of an unloving parent so terrible and unaccepting that he publically and vitriolically disparages, abuses, and disowns his own trans daughter in front of millions of people that you have to leap to his defense, then there's nothing I can do for you, sir.
But I certainly hope you're not like that, so here are some links in good faith:
Logo Adventure for C64 Terrapin Logo:
https://donhopkins.medium.com/logo-adventure-for-c64-terrapi...
Micropolis: Constructionist Educational Open Source SimCity:
https://donhopkins.medium.com/har-2009-lightning-talk-transc...
This is Micropolis (open source SimCity) in WebAssembly:
This is The Sims 1 character animation system (which I original wrote in C++ 30 years ago) rewritten in TypeScript and WebGL:
Micropolis and other open source code, documentation, and designs for new educational software:
https://github.com/SimHacker/MicropolisCore/
MOOLLM Constructionism skill:
https://github.com/SimHacker/moollm/blob/main/skills/constru...
MOOLLM Adventure skill:
https://github.com/SimHacker/moollm/tree/main/skills/adventu...
Adventure Compiler:
https://github.com/SimHacker/moollm/blob/main/skills/adventu...
Gary Drescher's Schema Mechanism skill from "Made Up Minds" (based on his PhD thesis and book about how children learn, with his advisor Marvin Minsky at the MIT AI Lab):
https://github.com/SimHacker/moollm/blob/main/skills/schema-...
MOOLLM Play Learn Lift skill:
https://github.com/SimHacker/moollm/tree/main/skills/play-le...
Here's my reply with links to my past comments: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49671123
I understand that some consider Elon a Nazi but I don't consider that a common belief, so I don't know why I'd need to support that belief in order to talk about this Snap language and others, like Scratch.
So did you look at any of the links and videos I posted? Your reply totally ignored them, so I will give you another chance. Go read them, and then tell me what they said, and explain how can you continue to stand behind the false accusations you made about my friends and their motives, without acknowleding that your facts and opinions are provably mistaken.
Do you still continue to claim that a Snap is bullshit, that it's a toy, and that it's not connected to the real world?
You're the one who threw the first stone calling it "BS", with no evidence to back that up, and you certainly haven't said anything to support that, and it certainly isn't "BS" or a "toy" just because you say so but can't back up your insulting ignorant accusations.
I already showed you many ways Snap! connectes to the real world, and you are still denying all that. Are you calling me a liar, or do you just have no reading comprehension whatsoever? Do you not think robots, Arduinos, network programming, AI programming, computer science, algorithms, closures, continuations, functional programming, and meta programming are not the "real world"?
In case you didn't know, those are all things you can do with Snap!, and you can't deny you know because I already told you and gave youy links to prove it. You just ignored them, and kept claiming what they proved wrong.
Have you even looked at the college level computer science curriculum Brian Harvey wrote called "The Beauty and Joy of Computing"? I highly doubt it, because the false claims you are making about Snap! fly in the face of everything in that book. It proves you wrong. So what is your definition of the "real world", if not all that I cited and the book teaches?
Then how do you reconcile your denial of reality with all the proof that you're wrong that I posted? I don't expect you to be able to, because, as I said, you're not arguing in good faith, so it's not worth engaging with you. You don't bother reading anything other people post, or replying to what other people say, so reading what you write is a complete waste of time.
If you are capable of arguing in good faith, then tell me if you would treat your own children the way Elon Musk treats his own trans daughter? Do you believe he's a good father, or a transphobic bigot? And if you really don't believe he was making a Nazi salute, then record a video of yourself doing the exact same thing Musk did, post it to youtube under your real name, and then post a link to it. Or is there some reason you don't want to do that, huh?
I've already made my points very clear about this, sure, you can do that, but how many are actually doing AI programming in Snap? Why would you? It's very niche and real software doesn't get made in Scratch or Snap. I would say the same thing about Arduino and other things. Again, my opinion, beware.
Again, I don't even know you, I don't know about your friends, I never threw any "stones" here on purpose. I don't expect someone to get so hurt over me criticizing a Scratch-like programming language when posting on HN. Should I expect the same for calling Scratch a toy language?
> If you are capable of arguing in good faith, then tell me if you would treat your own children the way Elon Musk treats his own trans daughter? Do you believe he's a good father, or a transphobic bigot? And if you really don't believe he was making a Nazi salute, then record a video of yourself doing the exact same thing Musk did, post it to youtube under your real name, and then post a link to it. Or is there some reason you don't want to do that, huh?
So everyone who thinks Elon did not do a heil hiler salute to show off how big of a Nazi he is, is now forced to do this because Don Hopkins said so? aye aye sir!
"Or is there some reason you don't want to do that, huh?" is absolutely ridiculous.
You need to self-reflect.
Remember, I am still waiting for your definition of what "_really_ programming" is, that classifies Scheme as "real" programming language, but not Snap!.
Clue: it's impossible to make such a definition, because Snap! is fully as powerful as Scheme (and not in the trivial sense of "Turing Completeness"), just easier for kids to use.
Again, you're only proving that you didn't read or understand a thing I wrote. I already gave you links to Ken Kahn's eCraft2Learn project and Jen Mönig's demos, but obviously you didn't look at any of it.
Since you refuse to look at or acknowledge anything I link to, I will walk you through some of it here.
TL;DR: Ken and Jens and others are successfully using pure Snap! to teach AI and machine learning to kids. This directly contradicts all of your accusations. Here is the proof.
Ken arrived at the MIT Artificial Intelligence Laboratory in the 1970s, where Marvin Minsky and Seymour Papert served on his PhD committee. His thesis "Creation of Computer Animation from Story Descriptions" was a very early example of generative AI.
During the 1970s (specifically between 1973 and 1979), Ken taught artificial intelligence to elementary school children as a graduate researcher in the MIT AI Laboratory's Logo Group.
He developed a distributed concurrent constraint visual programming language called Pictorial Janus in 1990-1991.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Janus_(concurrent_constraint_p...
From 1995-present, he developed a visual programming language called ToonTalk, that looks and feels like a 3D video game, for teaching programming and high level CS concepts like concurrency and message passing to kids.
https://toontalk.com/English/kenkahn.htm
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ToonTalk
53 years after he started teaching Logo to kids with Seymour Papert at the MIT AI Lab Logo Group, he's still teaching AI Programming and Computer Science to kids, now with Snap! and his eCraft2Learn project. Here are his 172 citations on google scholar:
https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=9hQiyqcAAAAJ&hl=en
Here's a video of Jens Mönig demonstrating the data extensions to Snap! that enable programming neural nets in pure Snap! block code.
No JavaScript. No WASM. No WebGPU or WebGL. Pure Snap! blocks.
Again, disproving your accusations that Snap! is bullshit, a toy, has no connection to the real world, and is not useful for teaching AI or advanced computer science concepts.
What's new in Snap! 11 - Data - Extensions - Neural Networks
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9W04TEMBUk
My (Jens Mönig's) closing keynote address at SnapCon25 in Heidelberg, introducing deep machine learning capabilities to Snap as an alternative way to create custom predicate blocks.
The projects created "live" during this talk can be found here:
Backpropagation ANN Sprite Layers:
https://snap.berkeley.edu/snap/snap.html#present:Username=je...
Instruments Recognition:
https://snap.berkeley.edu/snap/snap.html#present:Username=je...
Gesture Recognition:
https://snap.berkeley.edu/snap/snap.html#present:Username=je...
Transcript excerpts about how Snap! teaches AI programming and CS concepts to kids. All quotes are from Jens Mönig's closing keynote address at SnapCon25 (lightly edited for clarity), with links to the video timestamps so you can verify each quote's source of truth:
NOT A TOY: IT TEACHES THE HIGH-LEVEL IDEAS
Abstraction has nothing to do with technology -- it is philosophy
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9W04TEMBUk&t=554s
> This is not about ones and zeros. This is not about how a processor works. This is not about how technology works. This has nothing to do with technology. This is all about philosophy. This is all about how we humans think about things.
If you think teaching merge sort is teaching algorithms, you are not doing your job
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9W04TEMBUk&t=4518s
> If you're teaching merge sort and you think you're teaching algorithms, that's fine for teaching an algorithm, but you're not doing your job.
Hyperblocks: if it takes one number, it takes any dimension of numbers
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9W04TEMBUk&t=319s
> The cool thing about Snap! that we've told you all along, and that's been a theme of this conference, is that if it takes one number, it takes one number in any dimension, or it takes any dimension of numbers.
REAL NEURAL NETWORKS, IMPLEMENTED IN SNAP! ITSELF
There is no secret JavaScript block
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9W04TEMBUk&t=3757s
> These neural networks are all implemented in Snap! itself. There is no secret JavaScript block in there. It's all implemented using this new object-oriented system that we have in there, where we just have prototypical inheritance with actual objects with a new request block.
The Nobel Prize in Physics, in one line of blocks
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9W04TEMBUk&t=2097s
> This thing here is the current Nobel Prize of Physics. And I've seen more complicated code than that.
Asked on stage whether that script is the whole perceptron
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9W04TEMBUk&t=4672s
> "Is that all there is to a perceptron?" -- "Yes." -- "So there's not any hidden magic?" -- "Nope. This is why we wanted to have it out in the open. There's no -- this is it."
KIDS CAN ACTUALLY DO THIS
A perceptron is simpler than the projects the kids in your classes already write
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9W04TEMBUk&t=1234s
> This is a perceptron and this is a layer in a neural network. You've all written more complicated stuff than this, and the kids in your classes have written more complicated projects than this.
Using neural nets in Snap! is high school work
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9W04TEMBUk&t=4490s
> I would expect that just using these neural nets to be something that you could probably do in high school.
Not teaching backpropagation in college is killing computer science
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9W04TEMBUk&t=4502s
> Honestly, I think if you're not teaching backpropagation in college, you're killing computer science. This is the most relevant algorithm around.
CONNECTED TO THE REAL WORLD
Training a net live, on stage, on his own harmonica and recorder
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9W04TEMBUk&t=2460s
> It'd be way cooler if we could use our own data. So let me use my own data.
Same algorithm: one instrument from another, one drawing from another, a sea mine from a rock
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9W04TEMBUk&t=3723s
> It's the same neural network, the same algorithm, that can distinguish one instrument from another, one drawing from another, a sea mine from a rock. It's the same thing, folks.
Snap! 11 talks to Arduinos and speaks websockets
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9W04TEMBUk&t=3800s
> You've seen [Jan?] show that now we can connect to Arduinos in Snap! 11, because he has ported Snap4Arduino -- he called it the S4A bridge, which is the most enormous understatement there is. Bernat has contributed websockets, which is immensely useful.
AND NOT ONE INCH OF AI HYPE
Anyone selling you "explainable AI" is lying to you
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9W04TEMBUk&t=2272s
> If any company, if any mogul is telling you that they're working on explainable AI, they are lying to you. They're working on some chatbot that is going to come up with some gibberish that is going to be an explanation, but it's not going to be what's actually going on. There is no way to explain what's going on as soon as you have one hidden layer.
Would you take a life and death decision on an 80 percent chance?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9W04TEMBUk&t=1897s
> Think about 80%. This is a decision, friend or foe. Are you going to kill somebody with an 80% chance? Probably not. Are you going to take life and death decisions on an 80% chance? Probably not.
This might be the last algorithm we get to teach, so we had better teach it well
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9W04TEMBUk&t=3739s
> This thing is eating up our lunch. We want to teach algorithms. This might be the last algorithm we get to teach. We better teach it well.
I'm well aware that Snap has this stuff in it, and I understand it is used to teach and get kids interested about programming, I know.
I still do not understand why you'd want to learn AI with Snap/Scratch. I don't think that's a very controversial opinion?
If you just want to show kids some basic stuff okay sure, why not.
By the time you'd want to mess with neural networks, I think it'd be best to just use Python or something, not wrestle with this...
I appreciate you being so thorough with your references and the transcripts, and I think it's cool and interesting.
I'm just saying that for me I don't get why I'd use this or try to do these complex things in this Scratch format rather than jumping on an actual language where I don't need to rely on these extensions or new features, and I'd be learning a real language that is actually used in the real world.
And like, saying that Scratch is a toy language, I don't think that's a very controversial thing to say, so if I said the same thing about this, why be so offended over it? calling it BS, I can get that, but it was never directed towards anyone specifically, it was towards visual programming languages in general like Scratch. They serve a purpose, sure, but in my view, a very limited one. And I still don't see this being used like other languages for real stuff, aside from limited demos and exercises for kids.
You can say I'm wrong, that's completely fine. But I think you're missing my point here.
I replied to this comment:
> I don't love graphical programming environments like this and Scratch and I can't quite put my finger on why I find them so unattractive. > A big part of it is that you can, to some degree, learn programming from this. But you absolutely cannot learn software engineering from this.
And you then showed off some embroidery stuff and things that I explained that in my own opinion, are not connected to real world software engineering/programming, and seem to serve Snap rather than things that you'd actually use in the field.
That's my opinion and I'm allowed to have my own. Otherwise all I could say is that you're right and its awesome. Right?
And here you are attacking me with things like:
"but it's a waste of your time, because his comments have no value. Have you looked at any of those valuable links I did post yet, or did you just get stuck in the worthless rabbithole of his posting history?"
"dead boot licking comments don't deserved to be linked or repeated"
Because apparently I'm not allowed to have my own opinions of blocky visual programming languages. A bit fascist isn't it?
Anyhow
"I attended Snap!Con in Barcelona, played around with TurtleStitch myself, and still have and cherish the cool textile artifacts (and also cool friends) I made.
And the TurtleStitch presentation included live streaming video of students of diverse genders and cultures and ages enthusiastically showing off and talking about the beautiful physical objects they designed, programmed, made, presented to their parents and the conference, and are rightfully proud of, and discuss what they learned from the experience."
Okay, how does this disprove my point that its more about making machined embroidery accessible vs. learning CS concepts?
And who would attend Snap!Con unless they were part of that community working on the ecosystem or deeply involved with it?
You're projecting that I'm arguing in bad faith, but clearly that's you here, I can't really engage with you properly when your replies are full of things like:
" In a nutshell or TL;DR for someone unwilling to put in the time and effort to learn or even consider evidence, and who talks about promoting curiosity but is incurious yourself, and who performatively refuses to recognize an obvious Nazi salute and feels compelled to repeatedly defend and praise Elon Musk after he does it twice in a row on international television: it's all about Constructionist Education, not promoting or showing off a product, or selling computer controlled embroidery machines, Arduinos, and robots, or even a cynical huckster perennially promising full self driving cars and trips to Mars."
I visited all the links you provided and still arrived in the same conclusion.
and you're saying I'm incurious. Can you just stop lying and spreading lies about me? And when have I praised Musk?
If you're so emotionally attached to this 'language' that you feel the need to dig up "dirt" on me from my post history and spread lies and tell others that I'm some kind of fascist, maybe you should reevaluate your life choices. I wouldn't get this mad over someone criticizing Go or Rust etc.
And it proves that you're unable to take criticism of your language since you're convinced that no matter what, you're right and that with you posting some conference talk links, others should become convinced that it's a super relevant language.
And with regards to Constructionism, from my understanding, the main point seems to be to use existing knowledge to acquire more knowledge, CS/programming in this case.
From the Wikipedia page:
"The following five strategies make problem-based learning more effective:
1. The learning activities should be related to a larger task. The larger task is important because it allows students to see that the activities can be applied to many aspects of life and, as a result, students are more likely to find the activities they are doing useful."
This is exactly my criticism. With Snap / etc. the larger task is just a demo or something inside Snap. maybe controlling some robot, okay.
But it's not something you'd see in the real world, it can't be "applied to many aspects of life" in the context of CS, it's mostly constrained to Snap and its environment.
My belief is that learning is done best when there is a connection to something real, not just a simulation or an exercise. With Snap, it inevitably is kind of just a demo. Whereas with real languages you can get close to how things are done for real, which serve as a motivator and invoke curiosity.
Again, if it's your opinion that Snap is successful and that's why people are using it to learn to code, then that's fine. I haven't seen that happen yet and I believe there are reasons as to why I haven't seen that happen.
And since I'm here in good faith (unlike you) I will provide links to my Nazi comments as per your accusations:
- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49589879 - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49590610 - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49589966
btw, I have literally criticized the wealth of Musk in HN before and how it's unsustainable, same with the AI datacenter buildout and financial consolidation that's happening right now.
Considering your vast experience and knowledge, I find your conduct pretty embarrassing here.
Okay but you're stacking your unsubstantiated belief based on a sample of just you against an entire field of research where people have dedicated their lives, so maybe you can understand why some people take it personally when you just call it BS off the cuff?
> since you're convinced that no matter what, you're right
You're the one convinced you're right no matter what. You countered their very many resources with "Yeah but my belief". Okay, well what backs up your belief? Again, Scratch/Snap are backed up by decades of research, user studies, and deployments. It's not this one person's opinion what they're saying here.
> Whereas with real languages you can get close to how things are done for real, which serve as a motivator and invoke curiosity.
Have you actually examined if this is true or do you just feel that it is true? Moreover, even if it is true, have you examined if this is the only and best way to do things for everyone or do you just feel it?
No, I usually don't understand why people take it personally if it's not directed towards anyone, but I do understand why it would come off as demeaning, so for that I apologize.
However it was not to the degree where this guy's response was warranted at all. Not one bit.
> You're the one convinced you're right no matter what. No. I never said I was right. I've literally multiple times said that it is MY opinion, and my view point, and that I'm simply saying what I think.
Okay, decades of research and whatnot, so is the conclusion that Snap is perfect for what it's intended and that there is no room for criticism or opposing views against it? Would I have to do decades of research in order to say anything about Snap? That would basically mean it's immune from criticism. We can say the same things about SAP for example.
again, I was replying to this comment:
> I don't love graphical programming environments like this and Scratch and I can't quite put my finger on why I find them so unattractive. > A big part of it is that you can, to some degree, learn programming from this. But you absolutely *cannot learn software engineering* from this.
I am not saying that it doesn't fill a niche, it's literally what I've already said, but I said that it doesn't mean that it is widely applicable, which is *totally fine*
> Have you actually examined if this is true or do you just feel that it is true? Yes, my experience was this. I never said it was for everyone, and you obviously know that, there's no way something will work for absolutely everyone
and I also haven't met basically anyone who learnt programming with Scratch or etc., it was mostly though playing around with real stuff in primitive ways and learning how things work until they became familiar.
I don't understand. There are a few people here who said they learnt programming through scratch, and that's great. However, I'm giving my own subjective experience and my thoughts as to why imo this is not as effective as some might claim, and especially for actually learning programming, not just gaining interest (which would be a small niche)
I think it's totally fine to give your own views, opinions and beliefs on a HN post subject, and I believe that progress happens through people communicating their own ideas and beliefs about things, from which others can then gain new perspectives outside of their own.
I also think it's very much against the hacker spirit to simply shut down everything because there isn't decades of research behind an argument.
You can discard all my beliefs and arguments here and that's totally fine. If they spark some idea or some theory, that's even better. Or if it's something you can relate to and go "oh so it's not just me!" that's also cool. Like how I felt with the original reply.
Agreed.
> so is the conclusion that Snap is perfect for what it's intended and that there is no room for criticism or opposing views against it?
That's going too far in the opposite direction, no one has claimed that at all. Your opening post was "this is BS and just a toy, it's got no connection to the real world."
That was a strong negative statement so you've elicited strong pushback.
> and I also haven't met basically anyone who learnt programming with Scratch or etc.,
Well what kind of people do you associate with? What age group? I'm 40, people my age learned Logo as kids, which was the first language of its kind but also quite old by the 90s when I learned it. Before Logo, no one really made languages for kids.
The last student I taught who reported having learned from Logo was in 2020 and he was from Greece, so I think it may have some special appeal there. Beyond that, most of my students (I have taught thousands) report having their first programming experience in Scratch, regardless of whether they are majoring in CS or not. I can count on one hand the number of students who started learning naturally via Python or Javascript or even HTML before being introduced by a teacher to Scratch.
> I think it's totally fine to give your own views
It's totally fine to give your own views and you've spent many posts and many characters doing just that, so you haven't been impeded.
What I and others have are asking is for you to consider something beyond your own views. You've already acknowledged that probably you're not the target audience here, and it's exactly that: Scratch is not for you, and that's okay. That doesn't mean your way doesn't work when it works, but if you want to say something more about how far your method goes or Scratch's efficacy, you need something more than your own views.
Look, I'm actually with you -- I started programming on a mechanical typewriter at 5, and kept going from there. I love running enrichment programs for kids who are like that because you can give them anything and they'll just go with it. But really, only <1% of kids are like that.
Yes, the phrasing I used was simply to point out that without the possibility of giving my beliefs and thoughts, we'd end up in this loop where you could only chime in if you can back your arguments with all kinds of research and citations, which usually ends up shutting the conversation down entirely, because the people involved in such projects can do so but most can't.
Strong pushback is completely fine and I appreciate it. It's kind of what I try to aim for, because it allows us to get down to the truth, or something of value.
> Well what kind of people do you associate with? What age group? I'm 40, people my age learned Logo as kids, which was the first language of its kind but also quite old by the 90s when I learned it. Before Logo, no one really made languages for kids.
I started programming at around 12, and many people that I know are in their 20-30s or so. I don't have experience with Logo or have heard of anyone in my circles using it.
Many of my friends began by tinkering with games, writing scripts for them or just writing basic scripts in Bash/Batch/JS/Python and moving to C#/C++ etc.
And I don't think Scratch is completely irrelevant, I just simply think that it is a very limited tool, it's got very few use cases, and that you're better off moving off of it sooner than later, rather than trying to use it for more complex projects or exercises.
> What I and others have are asking is for you to consider something beyond your own views.
And I appreciate that, but I don't think this was simply the case (not talking about you)
for example my reply at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49666774 , I was very upfront with what motivated me and what angle I was coming from, and Don seemed to reply to me trying to convince me that I was mistaken and that in fact it was very relevant and that it "teaches real CS at college level"
I then replied in the aforementioned post that I still didn't get it, and what my motivations were when getting into programming and why the examples he gave didn't change my opinions and why I felt like that.
You replied there with "nor is it to prepare students for study in a CS program." but that was part of my criticism because he claimed that.
Scratch/Snap is fine for what it is, as a way to get young kids interested in the simple primitives of programming and logic. That's great! But again, I think there's a reason why some people, including I, don't see the appeal of these for actual "programming", which is what he tried to show me it's useful for.
That's what I meant with "toy". It's not _really_ programming, and it's very niche, which you seem to point out with how young kids viewed it as an "extension of art and play"
And I absolutely agree, don't put a 5 year old on a bash terminal or an IDE, but I'm not talking about that here. Don was giving out links on Arduinos, Web APIs/IoT, ML/AI, sensors, etc. that's what I meant with "missing the mark"
But I know that even in e.g. where I live, if you join an after-school computer club or whatever, they will happily let you do simple Java courses (MOOCs), or at least they used to do so, even at like 6th grade.
> Look, I'm actually with you -- I started programming on a mechanical typewriter at 5, and kept going from there. I love running enrichment programs for kids who are like that because you can give them anything and they'll just go with it. But really, only <1% of kids are like that.
Yes, that's why I'm aware that I may be missing something here, but I don't think even what you're pointing out here contradicts my core points, unlike with what Don tried to convey in his initial reply.
And the reason why I've kept engaging is because I thought that my point of view may be unique and maybe there could be something there which would explain why these kinds of "languages" don't work for specific situations or audiences. If it was just about it being a language for young kids to explore basic programming logic, I wouldn't have argued against it at all.