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When I was a little kid, I was at a department store and saw a guy doing something with a television. Or so I thought.

Me: What are you doing?

He: I am programming. What's your name?

Me: MG

He: Check this out:

    10 PRINT "MG"
    20 GOTO 10
Me: Woah!

I picked a book from a shelf about "Basic" and started to try figuring out how this worked. And never stopped. Have been looking at these "televisions" more than anything else since then.



Scene playing out ca. 2013:

Store Manager: It looks like someone hacked our computer, let's call the police, they'll know what to do.

FBI: Our diligent detective work has uncovered the perp is named MG. We will lock him up for 20 years for a CFAA violation.

Store Manager: Isn't that kind of harsh? I've since called the tech support line who told me to turn it off and back on again, and that seems to have fixed it.

Corporate management: We don't support this prosecution.

Prosecutor: Our job is to work in the public interest. Microsoft has suffered because people might think their operating system isn't secure.

MG: All this stress of being persecuted by a bureaucratic meat grinder is making me awfully depressed ...

... talk about a much different type of life changing event.


More like 1983. This was me at our local Sears department store, loading up every demo BASIC computer with digital vandalism.


I’m guessing the parent was referencing Aaron Swartz: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aaron_Swartz


checks out


Same thing for me watching my 5th grade teacher program a Commodore Vic-20. I was instantly hooked.


[deleted]


While I appreciate this comment is well-intentioned, can we please not turn HN into Reddit? I strongly prefer ready more pithy content.




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