
Let's do more computer science - davewiner
http://scripting.com/stories/2010/10/03/letsDoMoreComputerScience.html
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sthatipamala
I'm a sophomore in college and I agree. Emphasis on making mindless web apps
has made my peers (and me, sadly) into consumers of SDKs and frameworks,
rather than producers of technology.

To add to the confusion, every VC with a blog is writing about how CS
education is irrelevant and that it's worth dropping out. But I doubt that the
core tech behind Google or the erstwhile Sun could have been made if their
founders hadn't learned proper computer science.

~~~
nlawalker
Google is not like the current wave of VC web apps: it was built on an idea
that couldn't exist without the proper technology. For most VCs, that
technology is merely "the internet," and their ideas simply leverage web
connectivity to get up and running so they can see how they do in the
marketplace. If a stronger technological backbone is needed later, they can
always hire computer science grads.

For example, Facebook didn't need computer scientists to start out, but it
needed them to grow. For VCs looking to make a buck, the business idea comes
first, and innovation in technology can follow if it needs to.

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aminuit
Selection bias much? He's complaining about an over abundance of consumer
facing web businesses at an event sponsored by a blog that focuses almost
exclusively on consumer facing web businesses.

There is lots of real computer science going on in the world, and there's a
bunch of money being thrown at it. It's just that you won't hear about any of
it by reading TechCrunch all day.

~~~
sthatipamala
On which sites will I hear of this "real computer science"? I'd be interested
in reading them along with my daily dose of HN and TC

~~~
scott_s
It's not going to show up popular websites much because CS research, like most
research, is not a popular topic. But if you want to know what's going on, a
great place to start is to start reading the proceedings of recent ACM
conferences:
[http://portal.acm.org/browse_dl.cfm?linked=1&part=series...](http://portal.acm.org/browse_dl.cfm?linked=1&part=series&coll=ACM&dl=ACM)

Yes, it's behind a pay-wall. Not much I can do about that [1]. And yes, you
will have to read academic papers. But that's where people talk about real
computer science.

[1] Although, if you find a title and abstract that sounds interesting, you
can usually just Google for the title and find a copy on the author's site.
All of my papers, for instance, are also on my webpage. And, yes, this is
explicitly allowed by the copyright transfer agreement.

~~~
apu
In some specific areas (like mine: graphics and vision), there are compiled
lists of recent papers from the best conferences, along with links to the
papers, project pages, etc.:

<http://kesen.realtimerendering.com/sig2010.html>

<http://www.cvpapers.com/cvpr2010.html>

<http://www.cvpapers.com/eccv2010.html>

<http://www.cvpapers.com/iccv2009.html>

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scott_s
_We used to do that, when I was a comp sci grad student in the 1970s._

And that still happens... in grad school.

I am confused by this essay - I'm not sure what his main point is. I'm going
to guess it's "we're not doing enough computer science." But his example for
this being the case is a conference focused on startups, which is a complete
non-sequitur to me. It's like sitting in a biology lecture and wondering why
these people aren't doing more physics.

~~~
davewiner
We're doing a hackathon at NYU and if it's like last year's it will be replay
of the kind of hackathon they do at TechCrunch. I'm saying our students should
be encouraged to do projects that aren't just subsets of whatever was hot with
the VCs and angel investors 8 months ago. I thought I was pretty clear about
that in the piece, but then you'd have to actually read it to figure that out.

~~~
scott_s
I read the piece - twice, actually, because I was looking for a clear thesis.
I still find it strange that you want students to do as you did in grad school
at an event focused on startups. If you want to find oranges, don't look in an
apple orchard.

~~~
davewiner
I want them to use the computer science skills they learned at the university
that is holding the hackathon. Is that simple enough for you?

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metamemetics
> _We used to do that, when I was a comp sci grad student in the 1970s. I
> think we got way too caught up in the commercialism._

Students choosing to study computer science today are motivated by different
reasons than their counterparts from the 70s. Many choose to study computer
science at the undergraduate level specifically for these commercial aspects
that were not present 30-40 years ago.

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robryan
There is a good reason why good computer science doesn't come out of a
hackathon type setting. Good computer science that shows us something new
really requires at least 6 months of solid work to get up to date on some of
the research in a narrow field. Even after over 6 months of reading academic
papers I realized I would have to keep my focus narrow because some of the
other things I thought about would have required much more reading.

In a short period of time you can't really hope to produce anything meaningful
in new ground, you can however produce interesting little ideas and mashups
which is what hackathon like events tend to focus on.

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ziadbc
I agree with you wholeheartedly, and I would hybridize what you said a bit.

There are always amazing things being studied in computer science, and those
are a huge opportunity of things to be monetized.

Just as things like the web browser and pagerank came out of university
research, we should be looking in academia for the next massive opportunities
in technology.

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readtodevelop
The author points that programming projects are driven by or looking for
venture capital, so there are few computer science projects.

What is the solution? You can't pay creative people to build computer science.
The only think that society can do is to increase the respect and
consideration for those that strive to widen the frontiers of knowledge. The
great work will be done when those men reflect a flame in their eyes.

Inspiration is the force of gravity for discovery, but not everyone lives in
the same planet here. Allow people to grow and make research and you should
find inspiration and the force to discover and innovate.

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AmitinLA
I'm not a coder/hacker/tech person and largely ignorant of the issues that are
being discussed in this post. But, I'm curious: is some of this similar to the
(mostly light-hearted) tension I've seen in my personal life between
physicists and engineers?

~~~
pmjordan
I don't think it's meant in that way. I think the author fears that young
computer scientists are being coddled - instead of encouraging them to learn
how to solve hard problems, they are rewarded for producing work with little
substance but lots of polish.

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benjamin_s
The main issue with this is the people that are complaining about the up
coming generation of computer scientist are doing nothing to improve the
situation.

Why isn't there a site dedicated to computer science like the khan academy?

Why aren't you creating resources for students that can help us understand why
the fundamental concepts of computer science matter?

We obviously need help.

~~~
JoachimSchipper
I'm not a computer scientist, but I would like to point you to the MIT
OpenCourse site (<http://ocw.mit.edu/>). Or any number of similar sites. Or
even algorithm competitions like ACM ICPC/Topcoder.

