[2008] "Optimism, pessimism, fuck that; we're going to make it happen. As God is my bloody witness, I'm hell-bent on making it work." (http://www.wired.com/science/space/news/2008/08/musk_qa)

Elon Musk doesn't seem like the easiest person to work with, but I'm having a hard time thinking of a more accomplished human.

He's still missing the point.

If anything "learning to code," is just bad language to describe something more worthwhile: teaching people the fundamentals of algorithmic and logical thinking. We don't teach mathematics to kids so that they will all become mathematicians and we certainly don't teach them literacy so that they will all become the next J.D. Salinger. They are just tools for solving other problems. "Learning to code," is just another tool that will become ever more prevalent in the years to come.

The problem of not teaching these fundamental principles is that when it does become useful to do so it will be too late. We cannot afford to wait yet another generation to teach these ideas and principles. I think we're far enough along by now in the development of computer science to have a basic language of things to talk about. If we at least teach people these things then how many other judges in technology patent cases will be able to at least have an intuition to call out a patent troll? How many office workers will be able to find hidden information in their data or automate the repetitive tasks they do and move on to better things? How many of them will know that at least it can be done and perhaps they should hire a programmer?

As it stands right now most people don't even have an intuition of what can be done with a computer. Their world is comprised of apps and silos. When they get onto an airplane they have no idea that they're sitting in a flying solaris box with wings. They don't realize that their e-reader is a general purpose computing device capable of more than just downloading books from that one store they bought it from.

I don't think anyone advocating algorithmic literacy is suggesting that we train legions of crafts-people.

edited for grammar

This is a great idea, but on the off chance they read this, it must stay focused.

A very common mistake on the internet is to see a group interested in some topic, and to mistake the group for the mass of individuals that make it up, to think that the group itself has some sort of individual ontological existence, and that the individuals are somehow stuck to this "group" thing. If this experiences any success at all, calls will be issued by the hundreds to take this platform and group of people and get them to do something else. Perhaps even something nice sounding. And if you give in, you will in mere minutes destroy the entire thing, because there isn't actually an entity that can be led around... instead, there is a whole bunch of individuals who will rapidly and correctly conclude this thing is no longer what they signed up for, if they wanted a general advocacy group they'd do something else, and the whole thing will dissolve in a puff of smoke.

It's a great idea, but it needs to stay laser-focused on the Internet freedom issues that created it, and nothing else. No matter how tempting. You can not take the resulting group and use it like a handle to move people's opinions around in any direction.