Alan Kay wins another prize
Alan Kay has won the Kyoto Prize for his work on Smalltalk. He won a few other prestigious awards recently as well:
Earlier this month, Kay received the 2003 Turing Award from the Association for Computing Machinery for his breakthrough concepts on personal computing and for leading the team that invented Smalltalk, the first complete dynamic object-oriented programming language. The Turing Award, considered the "Nobel Prize of Computing," carries a $100,000 prize, with funding provided by Intel Corp.
In February, Kay won the National Academy of Engineering's 2004 Charles Stark Draper Prize along with three colleagues for their 1970s work at Xerox's Palo Alto Research Center. The team, credited with creating the first practical networked personal computer, included Kay, Robert W. Taylor, Butler W. Lampson and Charles P. Thacker. The prize, given to an engineer whose accomplishment has significantly impacted society, included a $500,000 cash award.
All these awards... almost as if Smalltalk represents a big leap forward or something :)
Comments
Re: [Smalltalk Tidbits, Industry Rants] Alan Kay wins another prize
[ Travis Griggs] June 21, 2004 16:37:00.047
Comment on Smalltalk Tidbits, Industry Rants Alan Kay wins another prize by Travis Griggs
It's actually very ironic. Alan has repeatedly made it clear that Smalltalk innovation has nearly died, a long time ago. He's getting awards for work that was original a long time ago. Kind of like the path to Sainthood, I guess.
WIMP & PCs
[Isaac Gouy] June 21, 2004 18:15:49.725
"Alan Kay has won the Kyoto Prize for his work on Smalltalk"
The UCLA website states 'Kay was chosen for "creating the concept of personal computing and contributing to its realization."'
The ACM press release states 'for leading the team that invented Smalltalk, an influential programming language that used object-oriented concepts, and for fundamental contributions to personal computing'.
And the 2004 Recipients of the Charles Stark Draper Prize achieved far more than the design of a programming language.
As it should be
[] June 21, 2004 18:19:57.583
He's getting awards for work that was original a long time ago.
Isn't this as it should be?
Not just for a programming language
[] June 21, 2004 18:23:38.816
Yes, these awards are clearly not "just for Smalltalk". But when you read Kay's history of Smalltalk, or any early history of Xerox PARC, what's clear is that these ideas are all related and influenced each other. The hardware and software related to the Alto and to Smalltalk were about "personal computing" in general.