鲜花( 152) 鸡蛋( 1)
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Randy Pausch’s Last Lecture: Really Achieving Your Childhood Dreams
* m& R: Z: j4 NGiven at Carnegie Mellon University
0 \$ G/ |" c* `* }Tuesday, September 18, 2007
; s3 p' V1 f5 d# b& {1 @3 Q, _4 @McConomy Auditorium
\: s- Z& V+ }! H- |& h, e1 uFor more information, see www.randypausch.com
5 K: V( V& j! D# h" X© Copyright Randy Pausch, 20071
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( X! h' u2 v! n- W# O1 _Introduction by Indira Nair, Carnegie Mellon’s Vice Provost for Education:
1 m0 [8 m, ~ ?* ?5 P6 n0 ~2 xHi. Welcome. It’s my pleasure to introduce you to the first of our new university’s lectures titled
/ M& T4 r) l2 {6 }7 iJourneys – lectures in which members of our community will share with us reflections and insights* Y( e( p& _# ? e9 |. J
on their personal and professional journeys. Today’s Journey’s lecture as you all know is by
" S, }, h3 R( |# p$ I: P* sProfessor Randy Pausch. The next one is on Monday, September 24th by Professor Roberta Klatzky.; E; P7 r/ b. l# p5 c E
To introduce Professor Randy Pausch, our first Journeys speaker, I would like to introduce Randy’s
0 n* _) K y' M! W/ I* S+ dfriend and colleague, Steve Seabolt. Steve has been at Electronic Arts for six years and is the Vice* ?. c: f8 R: l
President of Global Brand Development for The Sims label at Electronic Arts. As you all know, The
2 L7 ~7 Q6 Z g* u8 M! N' RSims is one of the most, if not the most successful PC games in the world, with sales approaching! H7 U0 Z2 C+ l! f
over $100,000,000. Prior to that, Steve was the Vice President for Strategic Marketing and s3 A6 f, b6 r( C! i! U' e
Education at EA, bridging academia and Electronic Arts. His goal was to work with academics so
( l) | ?% D/ S& M4 k; Pthere was an effective educational pathway for kids with building games as their dreams. It was in3 N b% q( _+ C
that role that Randy and Steve became colleagues and friends. Before Electronic Arts, Steve was the
" m( d# N6 B) t8 jworldwide Ad Director for Time Magazine and CEO of Sunset Publishing, which is a very favorite) m/ y' m$ @/ d! e8 M, W8 ~7 S$ j
magazine in the Southwest, and as CEO there, one of the things he started was school tours,! c1 E9 ^8 m3 V, j% R' _: `
because like Randy he shares a passion for inspiring kids of all ages to share their excitement for
9 s, A! p' w3 s, |: N' h' N* Bscience and technology., S, O. V5 | A& L/ x
So to introduce Randy, his friend Steve Seabolt. Steve?
( c0 k; P a8 E* z" _: _[applause]
1 w- u8 C+ d, O& |0 mSteve Seabolt, Vice President of Worldwide Publishing and Marketing for Electonic Arts (EA):# {5 {/ J0 K r- E$ Z8 g0 `
Thank you very much. I don’t mean to sound ungracious by correcting you, but given that our PR3 _" ^& R& W$ h6 s) n
people are probably watching this on webcast, I’d catch heck if I went home and didn’t say that it3 W+ _0 x" X* E3 x* a! x
was 100 million units for The Sims. [laughter] Not that big numbers matter to Electronic Arts.. G8 X, R8 Z K; p. C
[laughter]( y- E' r( E" M
I don’t see any empty seats anywhere, which is a good thing, which means I just won a bet from
" }! e' } f+ M4 t4 ^Randy as a matter of fact. Depending upon who’s version of the story you hear, he either owes me
" z. N5 Z2 }8 E# Q! z z20 dollars or his new Volkswagen. [laughter] So, I’ll take the car.
( y! H: k# w) p, e: Q4 G* `It’s a pleasure to be here, thank you very much. I’m going to start by covering Randy’s academic; ~& @1 N" b, a" n+ A2 l6 p
credentials. It’s a little bizarre for me to be standing here at Carnegie Mellon, which is a school I
/ t5 O2 b6 J9 Z4 dcouldn’t get into no matter how much I contributed to this institution. [laughter] But, no really, I’m
- x5 Q+ u- s5 i5 [" dnot kidding! You all think, oh gosh he’s humble. Really, no, I’m not humble at all. Very average SAT. X0 l% ?7 g: b# f8 n
scores, you know, right in the middle of my high school class of 900. Anyway, Randy. Randy earned, p8 j9 J9 C0 w& `/ [+ H) R% i
– it really pisses me off that Randy’s so smart—actually I called him, we decided about, what, four+ l0 j- }4 D, o3 ~( G% W
weeks, ago and we heard the news went from bad to horrific. It was on a Wednesday night and I
: ^* i; v- }: L) E, ?: q( jsaid look – we have two choices. We can play this really straight and very emotional , or we can go8 m. |( K" L' L$ A0 J
to dark humor. And for those of you who know Randy well, he was like oh, dark humor! So I called% M* T# K- p# D; T" X' s- x
him the next day and I was like, dude you can’t die. And he’s like, what do you mean? And I said,
- T v9 V/ J: ]0 f4 T* ? owell, when you die, the average of IQ of Seabolt’s friends is going to like drop 50 points. [laughter] To
" {; ~% T* H K. C: awhich he responded, we need to find you some smarter friends. [laughter] So you’re all smart
! @" A4 n- s! W' h4 N% E* n8 F6 I4 Vbecause you’re here, so if you want to be my friend, I’ll be over in a corner of the reception room.8 B$ N) f2 j/ o. p
Randy earned his undergraduate degree in Computer Science at Brown in 1982. His Ph.D. in CS from
) W8 R' `: J5 m1 ECarnegie Mellon in 1988 and taught at the University of Virginia where he was granted tenure a year
: J1 x2 C |5 L; {; ?* |& n0 R9 o Mearly. He joined the Carnegie Mellon faculty in 1997 with appointments in the CS, HCI and Design9 |+ u( b5 d9 j% ]! K
departments. He has authored or co-authored five books and over 60 reviewed journal and7 U5 Y& Q! l; I( G/ r( y' B
conference proceeding articles, none of which I would understand. With Don Marinelli, he founded) S9 A. V5 b, W- C; x( [
the Entertainment Technology Center, which quickly became the gold standard organization for
& H) B3 H& c& ?& `9 v5 e1 P- btraining artists and engineers to work together. It is my view and the view of our company,2 U3 e, b: ~" r8 c6 Z5 y0 f
Electronic Arts, that the ETC is the interactive program by which all others in the world are judged.
$ g& U N9 i& `4 Z+ H3 h; UI met Randy in the Spring of 2004, and when I look back it’s sort of hard to imagine it’s only been
2 k4 }; R* I# Y! S W2 t+ V3 w* othree years given the depth of our friendship. The ETC already had a very strong relationship with
% A9 [7 a* r; T/ ?/ @) K/ rEA and with Randy. And Randy as he always does, for those of you who know him well, wanted to( }1 O0 u; `! o
learn more, with his own eyes, about how the games business works, and how games really got
& e" `/ G1 ~4 R: `0 pmade. So he spent a summer in residence at EA, and I was his primary contact point. We were in
' M F; J& {# ?; m3 d: g. h+ d" Jmy view the odd couple. Randy the brilliant, charming, Carnegie educated CS professor. And me: J( Q+ Y2 l& x8 Q) p; C
who went to the University of Iowa on a wing and a prayer. We spent a lot of time together that' [: j; E$ F4 ~( v$ R; [2 O
semester and for those of you who know Randy well, that’s a lot of turkey sandwiches on white; \# N! R; O/ ^& z; v
bread with mayo. [laughter, clapping] My kids tease me about being “white.” There’s nobody more
7 `4 \: \4 D% |9 w# h: z“white” than Randy. [laughter] We spent an enormous amount of time together. We taught each
0 |0 [4 D, |- T+ h/ W% s& k1 qother about each other’s very interesting, strange cultures to the other. Academic versus the
; j D$ Z0 ]$ U6 Scorporate world. And we developed a deep friendship woven together with stories about our kids,9 G, ^& E7 e n
our wives, our parents, as well as deep discussions about the paramount nature of integrity in
0 P X1 S$ u0 i7 ?6 geverything you do, family first, religion, our shared joy in connecting people and ideas, and
; f2 v5 { P) \. I% v/ g0 qdeploying money and influence to do good. And the importance of having a lot of laughs along the4 m8 J1 Z1 k% e! t7 W! q# m/ f
way.
4 f4 A4 `( z/ k0 P# U) xRandy’s dedication to making the world a better place is self evident to anyone who has crossed1 a- c6 n7 P/ C% H; i
paths with him. Whether it’s directly influencing students, creating organizations like the ETC,- l9 D- N4 |+ p
building tools like Alice or doing what he probably does best, which is bridging cultures. As Ben
. _# k% w. @ ~1 \3 B. Y. l2 y8 eGordon, EA’s Chief Creative Officer, says of Randy, even more important than Randy’s academic,
* Y, E5 J9 s2 v5 n7 ~/ ~philanthropic, and entrepreneurial accomplishments has been his humanity and the enthusiasm he
$ Z3 A) r4 d l8 `9 l% l$ {brings to students and coworkers on a daily basis.
) ^# A+ S Y# g7 H' bFor those of you who know Randy, Randy brings a particular zest for life and humor, even while# I3 b0 |. x, z4 r1 o# }! G3 {0 p
facing death. To Randy, this is simply another adventure. It is my great honor to introduce Dylan, b- C1 I" Z( m
Logan and Chloe’s dad, Jai’s husband, and my very dear friend, Dr. Randy Pausch. [applause]
6 u0 z `) L8 hRandy Pausch:
9 n1 a1 h$ S$ c5 G. e/ W[responding to a standing ovation] Make me earn it. [laughter]
6 L9 E B7 ~7 i0 Z1 N# C( kIt’s wonderful to be here. What Indira didn’t tell you is that this lecture series used to be called the
+ L3 T3 ^, t( `1 l3 qLast Lecture. If you had one last lecture to give before you died, what would it be? I thought, damn,
: _6 D. a" t$ e* k) Z" wI finally nailed the venue and they renamed it. [laughter]
9 V* a0 A. B/ {; B* V" u3 `So, you know, in case there’s anybody who wandered in and doesn’t know the back story, my dad
4 v( S0 I a$ c! [always taught me that when there’s an elephant in the room, introduce them. If you look at my CAT
- P5 G# c8 W% y; hscans, there are approximately 10 tumors in my liver, and the doctors told me 3-6 months of good+ U$ e7 u# {9 ~) w/ r# T
health left. That was a month ago, so you can do the math. I have some of the best doctors in the* o8 W6 \$ n. Q3 \
world. Microphone’s not working? Then I’ll just have to talk louder. [Adjusts mic] Is that good? All Z e, x2 R/ U$ H9 W8 I
right. So that is what it is. We can’t change it, and we just have to decide how we’re going to
; ^0 B& ^ i7 Nrespond to that. We cannot change the cards we are dealt, just how we play the hand. If I don’t5 q9 @2 k; x' @) p& G" g8 j2 D; [
seem as depressed or morose as I should be, sorry to disappoint you. [laughter] And I assure you I; e: X! B" m( z/ |8 i' W
am not in denial. It’s not like I’m not aware of what’s going on. My family, my three kids, my wife,/ Q1 t* ?9 y2 T$ t3 f/ }4 G
we just decamped. We bought a lovely house in Virginia, and we’re doing that because that’s a; ]6 x- C3 M5 I& w; P! o9 X4 q5 F
better place for the family to be, down the road. And the other thing is I am in phenomenally good
; S; Q3 Q- C( T. T% T4 D+ A2 Bhealth right now. I mean it’s the greatest thing of cognitive dissonance you will ever see is the fact
3 z7 E5 L, j) o2 athat I am in really good shape. In fact, I am in better shape than most of you. [Randy gets on the
( Z1 ?: l% l9 G. {/ Yground and starts doing pushups] [Applause] So anybody who wants to cry or pity me can down and
2 g: H" H: _2 y7 ]5 t# Jdo a few of those, and then you may pity me. [laughter]
! @& T. |& e1 K+ o6 ^All right, so what we’re not talking about today, we are not talking about cancer, because I spent a, x! ^7 e5 o ?) ~. Q% k9 e
lot of time talking about that and I’m really not interested. If you have any herbal supplements or# t# M7 f( K- T* n0 ?
remedies, please stay away from me. [laughter] And we’re not going to talk about things that are4 }- L9 I( a2 K( F: ~7 O
even more important than achieving your childhood dreams. We’re not going to talk about my wife,% l- o& R7 @1 e( c' E0 P
we’re not talking about my kids. Because I’m good, but I’m not good enough to talk about that
, M! X0 b% P% i/ u* ]- Vwithout tearing up. So, we’re just going to take that off the table. That’s much more important.! x3 x$ O6 |( ]
And we’re not going to talk about spirituality and religion, although I will tell you that I have. X# F8 z. k$ q. S9 `8 ~( q
achieved a deathbed conversion. [dramatic pause] … I just bought a Macintosh. [laughter and' R& S9 S0 j# _+ o3 J9 U
clapping] Now I knew I’d get 9% of the audience with that … All right, so what is today’s talk about
+ d m: o7 B. O g* }/ qthen? It’s about my childhood dreams and how I have achieved them. I’ve been very fortunate that
" M$ s; `4 T' X* z6 B6 Gway. How I believe I’ve been able to enable the dreams of others, and to some degree, lessons
0 k. B. `7 k6 M8 clearned. I’m a professor, there should be some lessons learned and how you can use the stuff you
8 z# K' u$ K' {3 Z. chear today to achieve your dreams or enable the dreams of others. And as you get older, you may
. N2 ~0 i. Z6 W9 x- \( u0 wfind that “enabling the dreams of others” thing is even more fun.
; j Z; W6 R2 vSo what were my childhood dreams? Well, you know, I had a really good childhood. I mean, no
7 T% A6 A+ h) x* v# L. p2 Z3 m( nkidding around. I was going back through the family archives, and what was really amazing was, I# T7 h. ~$ E# \$ y: f: A, e! |7 w ~
couldn’t find any pictures of me as a kid where I wasn’t smiling. And that was just a very gratifying+ C; b+ q5 D }6 n! w$ P$ |0 A3 U
thing. There was our dog, right? Aww, thank you. And there I actually have a picture of me
4 \5 Q- U2 l" s/ p# F' W7 i' ?dreaming. I did a lot of that. You know, there’s a lot of wake up’s! I was born in 1960. When you3 |7 W K* V4 V! k, Y
are 8 or 9 years old and you look at the TV set, men are landing on the moon, anything’s possible.
4 s& L- J0 s$ `0 J/ N1 A) [! cAnd that’s something we should not lose sight of, is that the inspiration and the permission to& s4 V& ?# h2 h3 x4 ?4 R. Z+ |* I
dream is huge.
! V# o/ G& j: N6 l3 t7 f8 qSo what were my childhood dreams? You may not agree with this list, but I was there. [laughter]
2 v( A$ }8 ~7 _. B- vBeing in zero gravity, playing in the National Football League, authoring an article in the World Book
% }+ `% T' J; H, d# U* C% r4 Z8 t, SEncyclopedia – I guess you can tell the nerds early. [laughter] Being Captain Kirk, anybody here have: A2 w1 Q) W/ |2 u: I- g& s
that childhood dream? Not at CMU, nooooo. I wanted to become one of the guys who won the big4 E3 @/ S1 M! |# f; y6 A4 j
stuffed animals in the amusement park, and I wanted to be an Imagineer with Disney. These are not
! x5 e. @2 q- z4 U: Esorted in any particular order, although I think they do get harder, except for maybe the first one.
$ f% Y3 U; r6 A7 n0 @, uOK, so being in zero gravity. Now it’s important to have specific dreams. I did not dream of being an
) y% q& Z/ d& s# dastronaut, because when I was a little kid, I wore glasses and they told me oh, astronauts can’t have
7 F p' ]4 X; U1 {$ |9 u$ {; c* Xglasses. And I was like, mmm, I didn’t really want the whole astronaut gig, I just wanted the floating.
! `+ g d; q2 mSo, and as a child [laughter], prototype 0.0. [slide shown of Randy as a child lying in floatingformation; R& t0 e/ b- \6 `
on a table top] But that didn’t work so well, and it turns out that NASA has something
8 E0 Q- b K% z8 vcalled the Vomit Comet that they used to train the astronauts. And this thing does parabolic arcs,$ o/ |3 Z* q1 Q$ {$ w7 U
and at the top of each arc you get about 25 seconds where you’re ballistic and you get about, a; k& e9 M5 ]& X1 E' r
rough equivalent of weightlessness for about 25 seconds. And there is a program where college
2 `, @8 T0 s+ d5 |* h. pstudents can submit proposals and if they win the competition, they get to fly. And I thought that
" A" d: {7 V6 owas really cool, and we had a team and we put a team together and they won and they got to fly.1 W% j; g& @' w7 T
And I was all excited because I was going to go with them. And then I hit the first brick wall, because
7 q) B$ z' G+ mthey made it very clear that under no circumstances were faculty members allowed to fly with the
9 h5 L' i9 ~3 K/ L1 s& B, wteams. I know, I was heartbroken. I was like, I worked so hard! And so I read the literature very
8 e- U1 k" R' W( T) B' u6 F) jcarefully and it turns out that NASA, it’s part of their outreach and publicity program, and it turns
R- [0 i5 }" v$ I5 W+ G6 o7 jout that the students were allowed to bring a local media journalist from their home town.
/ R% W( o1 A6 }1 Y& o5 d[laughter] And, [deep voice] Randy Pausch, web journalist. [regular voice] It’s really easy to get a/ `, N" z6 g7 ]* h# b
press pass! [laughter] So I called up the guys at NASA and I said, I need to know where to fax some& ]2 @# _' x$ _$ N
documents. And they said, what documents are you going to fax us? And I said my resignation as) U$ L2 H! P' \1 k8 d9 f$ I+ B
the faculty advisor and my application as the journalist. And he said, that’s a little transparent, don’t' v/ B8 q7 _5 c
you think? And I said, yeah, but our project is virtual reality, and we’re going to bring down a whole
6 X% p$ I4 {" P, D* x8 r5 O" @bunch of VR headsets and all the students from all the teams are going to experience it and all those
/ T. S2 S7 u \2 d% A) h9 wother real journalists are going to get to film it. Jim Foley’s [who is nodding in the audience] going- E; T3 e# u! N( r4 w8 F: b
oh you bastard, yes. And the guy said, here’s the fax number. So, indeed, we kept our end of the
9 h+ K6 m$ w- I% `6 Xbargain, and that’s one of the themes that you’ll hear later on in the talk, is have something to bring M7 f" H. E6 `4 A! J; T2 U# L% h
to the table, right, because that will make you more welcome. And if you’re curious about what$ V% G( y% g% G l' O# `
zero gravity looks like, hopefully the sound will be working here. [slide shows videotape from
: g+ }4 B5 U8 l, d5 i5 U7 _Randy’s zero gravity experience] There I am. [laughter] You do pay the piper at the bottom. [laugher,! b( r& c6 k; W$ i" v. a
as the people in the video crash to the floor of the plane on the video] So, childhood dream number, V, A( G, ^3 s
one, check.% b! X2 P) ^5 n/ I/ z F8 J5 [0 l
OK, let’s talk about football. My dream was to play in the National Football League. And most of6 }$ P* X9 V2 L5 Y9 ]
you don’t know that I actually – no. [laughter] No, I did not make it to the National Football League,# f. j: I; g& e/ [
but I probably got more from that dream and not accomplishing it than I got from any of the ones
# l! c' e* v! q2 ]that I did accomplish. I had a coach, I signed up when I was nine years old. I was the smallest kid in8 [; d# c# `1 v6 g2 O- k) g) Z% a
the league, by far. And I had a coach, Jim Graham, who was six-foot-four, he had played linebacker6 o! j) `. U( b" _& U6 r3 [- G
at Penn State. He was just this hulk of a guy and he was old school. And I mean really old school.
; o0 O, N/ \. N! w3 wLike he thought the forward pass was a trick play. [laughter] And he showed up for practice the first# @( s) M+ o* s. F
day, and you know, there’s big hulking guy, we were all scared to death of him. And he hadn’t) m. _1 R- l- ] }, g: r* q1 Q; S6 d
brought any footballs. How are we going to have practice without any footballs? And one of the$ t& p4 w. A+ e4 x# |8 o, {+ L
other kids said, excuse me coach, but there’s no football. And Coach Graham said, right, how many
2 }, ]6 h8 h6 j, O/ @2 Amen are on a football field at a time? Eleven on a team, twenty-two. Coach Graham said, all right,
; N' y* \0 E" L ~( eand how many people are touching the football at any given time? One of them. And he said, right,' M1 @; h/ g3 c) e1 x
so we’re going to work on what those other twenty-one guys are doing. And that’s a really good
- P3 {/ s7 x0 s istory because it’s all about fundamentals. Fundamentals, fundamentals, fundamentals. You’ve got
0 S, M1 ]9 g( \0 J& k, A; e* sto get the fundamentals down because otherwise the fancy stuff isn’t going to work. And the other
# U9 S ~0 G* v% D) [% X4 Z7 QJim Graham story I have is there was one practice where he just rode me all practice. You’re doing
# o( p" z1 M5 O* S9 s& C% lthis wrong, you’re doing this wrong, go back and do it again, you owe me, you’re doing push-ups
. d& s4 @# Q) d/ c6 |* P+ J$ nafter practice. And when it was all over, one of the other assistant coaches came over and said,2 |; C4 ?/ x5 E0 j
yeah, Coach Graham rode you pretty hard, didn’t he? I said, yeah. He said, that’s a good thing. He+ ~# T; o. H1 b6 e2 P- Z
said, when you’re screwing up and nobody’s saying anything to you anymore, that means they gave
/ H6 q$ C) e" G; ^4 e# Pup. And that’s a lesson that stuck with me my whole life. Is that when you see yourself doing
9 O4 f: F% a4 k9 p! H2 Usomething badly and nobody’s bothering to tell you anymore, that’s a very bad place to be. Your
/ T. J) r- [; Y9 b& Ccritics are your ones telling you they still love you and care.
7 u7 O2 h6 O# p \2 W0 [3 iAfter Coach Graham, I had another coach, Coach Setliff, and he taught me a lot about the power of
$ X7 X, ?- j5 ]9 f& x% xenthusiasm. He did this one thing where only for one play at a time he would put people in at like
& J+ i7 |' n9 F: R5 L% ?7 Z, q$ Athe most horrifically wrong position for them. Like all the short guys would become receivers, right?/ G- u; [: b& v3 e9 _
It was just laughable. But we only went in for one play, right? And boy, the other team just never' j% Z3 v9 t) ?! l, c8 @
knew what hit ‘em them. Because when you’re only doing it for one play and you’re just not where1 m* E5 B: o9 \4 ~$ l- O8 X* v! ]) }
you’re supposed to be, and freedom’s just another word for nothing left to lose, boy are you going1 X6 u6 |: b k' K9 {1 m, h
to clean somebody’s clock for that one play. And that kind of enthusiasm was great. And to this3 g5 m5 ~' J( D; b7 q7 l: O) d
day, I am most comfortable on a football field. I mean, it’s just one of those things where, you6 n h. K: ?: @0 n. ]" w
know, [pulls out a football] if I’m working a hard problem, people will see me wandering the halls1 R7 l+ p4 V+ Y* ~0 ]4 J
with one of these things, and that’s just because, you know, when you do something young enough3 p* ^; {. q4 g: a
and you train for it, it just becomes a part of you. And I’m very glad that football was a part of my2 @$ [0 o! t6 W* d' f r1 E6 B
life. And if I didn’t get the dream of playing in the NFL, that’s OK. I’ve probably got stuff more- _- M7 z8 P9 L8 V
valuable. Because looking at what’s going on in the NFL, I’m not sure those guys are doing so great+ m! E' i9 I4 {7 C
right now.
1 e4 _* Q1 n+ h( `. VOK, and so one of the expressions I learned at Electronic Arts, which I love, which pertains to this, is
& S* Z7 T6 h& f& cexperience is what you get when you didn’t get what you wanted. And I think that’s absolutely$ D8 @" m: W, t
lovely. And the other thing about football is we send our kids out to play football or soccer or9 O2 U: H* _6 i9 |& h( D
swimming or whatever it is, and it’s the first example of what I’m going to call a head fake, or
6 _, S, x" \. G6 O3 ^& ^# V* jindirect learning. We actually don’t want our kids to learn football. I mean, yeah, it’s really nice that+ u" u1 n- a" c# e- f" X
I have a wonderful three-point stance and that I know how to do a chop block and all this kind of
: t) V1 p% A; l7 H, N/ Gstuff. But we send our kids out to learn much more important things. Teamwork, sportsmanship,
k$ _1 t4 @+ v* ?7 G% kperseverance, etcetera, etcetera. And these kinds of head fake learning are absolutely important.
- M4 | W$ Y) p7 j6 h1 [; r- o7 z% bAnd you should keep your eye out for them because they’re everywhere.7 {- Y G) A$ a- ~
All right. A simple one, being an author in the World Book Encyclopedia. When I was a kid, we had" r) J3 v8 }6 v! w8 _' Q
the World Book Encyclopedia on the shelf. For the freshman, this is paper. … We used to have these
" C+ D+ r9 M- n8 ]& x; l9 j5 U+ j& rthings called books. [laughter] And after I had become somewhat of an authority on virtual reality,
) _& p5 b4 r* Q/ fbut not like a really important one, so I was at the level of people the World Book would badger.% Q- J: a _! S# t
They called me up and I wrote an article, and this is Caitlin Kelleher [shows slide of Caitlin wearing
& W o5 @3 ]) t! ^ ]$ ? ^virtual reality headset manipulating a 3D world], and there’s an article if you go to your local library7 \/ ?3 L- N( u/ H- C
where they still have copies of the World Book. Look under V for Virtual Reality, and there it is. And$ S5 w% o: [0 X% k. c! W7 G$ Q* Z8 w* U2 }
all I have to say is that having been selected to be an author in the World Book Encyclopedia, I now. s% F# H" s' s4 L- I+ I2 T
believe that Wikipedia is a perfectly fine source for your information because I know what the( x8 o# \0 q/ M& d( P; b* ?- A s
quality control is for real encyclopedias. They let me in.
2 s- N* n! q/ t; NAll right, next one. [laughter] [shows slide “Being like Meeting Captain Kirk”] At a certain point you
5 a' a3 Q- ^4 t( j q4 J. fjust realize there are some things you are not going to do, so maybe you just want to stand close to
9 [* B" v1 o/ ?; V2 Athe people. And I mean, my god, what a role model for young people. [laughter] [shows slide of
- B* Q0 o7 }3 s1 ^* zCaptain Kirk sitting at his control station on the Starship Enterprise] I mean, this is everything you0 K! Q( J& \; f; B6 z2 s& [3 K
want to be, and what I learned that carried me forward in leadership later is that, you know, he
! w. ^; ?1 H2 e2 C! N0 fwasn’t the smartest guy on the ship. I mean, Spock was pretty smart and McCoy was the doctor and) }- p2 w2 L; u0 q* ]; O1 |1 r! i
Scotty was the engineer. And you sort of go, and what skill set did he have to get on this damn thing
7 L3 F1 k% J5 c# F$ [and run it? And, you know, clearly there is this skill set called leadership, and, you know, whether or) p& ^' c) y/ |' ]7 B+ N9 H
not you like the series, there’s no doubt that there was a lot to be learned about how to lead people! I& i- D5 F% G+ i" O
by watching this guy in action. And he just had the coolest damn toys! [laughter] [shows slide of
( I8 N6 ?0 ~. Y6 C+ H$ hStar Trek gadgets] I mean, my god, I just thought it was fascinating as a kid that he had this thing
7 Z5 ^4 Y" L3 o! x/ f[Takes out Star Trek Communicator] and he could talk to the ship with it. I just thought that was just @& `2 r% p& p, X% V
spectacular, and of course now I own one and it’s smaller. [takes out cell phone] So that’s kind of
9 m3 o: F. q9 x+ kcool.1 H% P$ u7 x9 y& k D
So I got to achieve this dream. James T. Kirk, and his alter ego William Shatner, wrote a book, which
8 k; H. U6 z+ H- H: v @, K8 j* fI think was actually a pretty cool book. It was with Chip Walter who is a Pittsburgh- based author
6 @5 T: z& a- Y: @! Y, d, u; s2 Zwho is quite good, and they wrote a book on basically the science of Star Trek, you know, what has+ s* k1 L# c- S: b1 Q
come true. And they went around to the top places around the country and looked at various things
1 B, v6 w* s5 J. P4 F6 R4 ]and they came here to study our virtual reality setup. And so we build a virtual reality for him, it
6 h# |- S' K' S- C- }8 B) t1 x3 Elooks something like that. [shows slide of virtual Star Trek bridge from the 1960’s TV show] We put it
0 o0 S% w1 q; {5 h5 s4 G0 {, `in, put it to red alert. He was a very good sport. [sarcastically] It’s not like he saw that one coming.
9 B9 c! s$ O: @% Y: u3 ^[laughter] And it’s really cool to meet your boyhood idol, but it’s even cooler when he comes to you4 a0 S' S* ^& i' P5 r+ Y" p
to see what cool stuff you’re doing in your lab. And that was just a great moment.
- F& t/ I0 R) GAll right, winning stuffed animals. This may seem mundane to you, but when you’re a little kid and
! q3 q7 }, y r1 |! k8 q: f& xyou see the big buff guys walking around the amusement park and they’ve got all these big stuffed
1 x9 _, @- g; H6 _5 sanimals, right? And this is my lovely wife, and I have a lot of pictures of stuffed animals I’ve won.8 C8 j- I$ D; I! ^. o5 x3 E
[laughter] [shows slides of several large stuffed animals] That’s my dad posing with one that I won.9 L, d& R5 s6 a" Z
I’ve won a lot of these animals. There’s my dad, he did win that one, to his credit. And this was just6 t$ E) L [4 g2 {
a big part of my life and my family’s life. But you know, I can hear the cynics. In this age of digitally
4 P9 w* u1 ?3 |; \0 _manipulated images, maybe those bears really aren’t in the pictures with me, or maybe I paid# y& V# D8 D, o8 j( ?
somebody five bucks to take a picture in the theme park next to the bear. And I said, how, in this
$ r. P5 u6 h( }+ A% A: mage of cynicism can I convince people? And I said, I know, I can show them the bears! Bring them
) s. d0 h* D; Y x. \9 W. ?out. [several large stuffed animals are brought onto the stage] [laughter and clapping] Just put them
9 G$ r9 b. U% I9 S# C9 W4 pback against the wall.
7 K; ]& Q- |4 T5 i" |Jai Pausch (Randy’s wife):
) D7 B2 ]) b& V2 G! f: W' uIt’s hard to hear you. [adjusts Randy’s microphone]
" B' m9 W) l% K, }0 Z" W! \* J0 \Randy Pausch:
4 v$ [6 s1 v# L m! u, OThanks honey. [laughter] So here are some bears. We didn’t have quite enough room in the moving5 ` g+ s: }. f) ^
truck, and anybody who would like a little piece of me at the end of this, feel free to come up and+ C/ X& k, J! ]& p8 p6 l' m( T
take a bear, first come, first served.
' |% k0 @; A9 o: BAll right, my next one. Being an Imagineer. This was the hard one. Believe me, getting to zero& w1 V0 |7 A5 F0 J, X
gravity is easier than becoming an Imagineer. When I was a kid, I was eight years old and our family
' \/ }9 c, _* m* r5 `took a trip cross-country to see Disneyland. And if you’ve ever seen the movie National Lampoon’s3 w5 |7 G5 H$ o! x, S4 [
Vacation, it was a lot like that! [laughter] It was a quest. [shows slides of family at Disneyland] And: b: B; N8 d% w) n* E
these are real vintage photographs, and there I am in front of the castle. And there I am, and for. E y+ U) D- t4 H/ O, T
those of you who are into foreshadowing, this is the Alice ride. [laughter] And I just thought this was8 f: d5 {0 z' ?! V2 ]
just the coolest environment I had ever been in, and instead of saying, gee, I want to experience this,
$ n! S: r2 o7 y; k# e1 eI said, I want to make stuff like this. And so I bided my time and then I graduated with my Ph.D./ @* Q! [8 h2 ]* j/ }* j) X4 D
from Carnegie Mellon, thinking that meant me infinitely qualified to do anything. And I dashed off
2 }4 O6 r0 z. r7 z) h; F0 \& v0 omy letters of applications to Walt Disney Imagineering, and they sent me some of the damned nicest$ y( Z5 i( z) J' ]
go-to-hell letters I have ever gotten. [laughter] I mean it was just, we have carefully reviewed your
+ |5 ~1 a9 ~' K% z! dapplication and presently we do not have any positions available which require your particular% l* R" T9 p6 j
qualifications. Now think about the fact that you’re getting this from a place that’s famous for guys
6 Y5 \, Z2 F, c3 Wwho sweep the street. [laughter] So that was a bit of a setback. But remember, the brick walls are- @! Y0 l0 W8 [. W$ M
there for a reason. The brick walls are not there to keep us out. The brick walls are there to give us- @! R5 _5 S; y, c9 X6 d* K
a chance to show how badly we want something. Because the brick walls are there to stop the
, b3 m8 K# l1 D' opeople who don’t want it badly enough. They’re there to stop the other people.9 w7 B& R) U/ E) H+ X
All right, fast forward to 1991. We did a system back at the University of Virginia called Virtual
, ` [0 P+ q j. v- W: z" P( a1 fReality on Five Dollars a Day. Just one of those unbelievable spectacular things. I was so scared6 ]2 x! C5 f0 o! j7 b8 N
back in those days as a junior academic. Jim Foley’s here, and I just love to tell this story. He knew
/ v/ q! P R2 f& b/ B( h' ]my undergraduate advisor, Andy Van Dam, and I’m at my first conference and I’m just scared to
: f' b4 P, Y) T; q( y6 Kdeath. And this icon in the user interface community walks up to me and just out of nowhere just! S: Q- U: n9 n5 m( @
gives me this huge bear hug and he says, that was from Andy. And that was when I thought, ok,
% E% {1 [9 H+ ]maybe I can make it. Maybe I do belong. And a similar story is that this was just this unbelievable
( `" O, z# n, o% Nhit because at the time, everybody needed a half a million [dollars] to do virtual reality. And
: U) D0 m) r8 {5 j4 Veverybody felt frustrated. And we literally hacked together a system for about five thousand dollars
- V7 w0 ]9 ~! Z5 R2 Ein parts and made a working VR system. And people were just like, oh my god, you know, the$ x" Y+ m5 j) W, v
Hewlett Packard garage thing. This is so awesome. And so I’m giving this talk and the room has just- ~8 z! L1 n# e! ?- d
gone wild, and during the Q and A, a guy named Tom Furness, who was one of the big names in8 a% p% \$ M& G, j9 e
virtual reality at the time, he goes up to the microphone and he introduces himself. I didn’t know
& n$ f6 q1 I: N# d" kwhat he looked like but I sure as hell knew the name. And he asked a question. And I was like, I’m
8 m" ^9 a! w3 G' H7 [# Nsorry did you say you were Tom Furness? And he said yes. I said, then I would love to answer your& a0 |" \ O* h5 Q; p
question, but first, will you have lunch with me tomorrow? [laughter] And there’s a lot in that little6 g- K: O5 F# N, D0 q3 u( `; P
moment, there’s a lot of humility but also asking a person where he can’t possibly say no. [laughter]: ?$ c& z. o- Z6 x3 K0 y5 ^
And so Imagineering a couple of years later was working on a virtual reality project. This was top
) N, o/ n% N5 n% Y# X$ msecret. They were denying the existence of a virtual reality attraction after the time that the! v! H+ {9 Y7 v' M
publicity department was running the TV commercials. So Imagineering really had nailed this one
* ^+ B* W) _. Etight. And it was the Aladdin attraction where you would fly a magic carpet, and the head mounted
* u) g/ G( h8 e- Idisplay, sometimes known as gator vision. And so I had an in. As soon as the project had just, you, @5 S3 t, h6 W. E/ I) L" P
know they start running the TV commercials, and I had been asked to brief the Secretary of Defense
, C. Q2 E! Y: _+ Bon the state of virtual reality. OK, Fred Brooks and I had been asked to brief the Secretary of' k+ c0 Q! l1 `5 L I7 X6 y
Defense, and that gave me an excuse. So I called them. I called Imagineering and I said, look, I’m7 `3 W- d5 `7 [9 ~/ n
briefing the Secretary of Defense. I’d like some materials on what you have because it’s one of the% X' ^3 s9 G7 B7 {
best VR systems in the world. And they kind of pushed back. And I said, look, is all this patriotism5 h* E* @( m2 i5 @& h
stuff in the parks a farce? And they’re like, hmm, ok. [laughter] But they said this is so new the PR/ A. A0 N6 E" {, {8 v: \! |
department doesn’t have any footage for you, so I’m going to have to connect you straight through6 P) X6 d7 u, \- x' I1 j5 T$ g" a
to the team who did the work. Jackpot! So I find myself on the phone with a guy named Jon Snoddy
& E: `1 P. P; M, n% e, Y+ g r3 pwho is one of the most impressive guys I have ever met, and he was the guy running this team, and
# R8 x. h! O: i p8 H+ @$ [; C6 }2 Nit’s not surprising they had done impressive things. And so he sent me some stuff, we talked briefly
9 S4 ~8 L& f$ \: e$ tand he sent me some stuff, and I said, hey, I’m going to be out in the area for a conference shortly,
. s% D& Z; N% Fwould you like to get together and have lunch? Translation: I’m going to lie to you and say that I; K+ o. o% k k9 ^& r4 u
have an excuse to be in the area so I don’t look too anxious, but I would go to Neptune to have) N* I& P' h1 u
lunch with you! [laughter] And so Jon said sure, and I spent something like 80 hours talking with all
+ i* L4 R# J( @/ d5 Gthe VR experts in the world, saying if you had access to this one unbelievable project, what would
/ K5 d+ J$ v5 U6 h& Dyou ask? And then I compiled all of that and I had to memorize it, which anybody that knows me
, j0 M/ ~* ^7 H! r" y6 ^8 bknows that I have no memory at all, because I couldn’t go in looking like a dweeb with, you know, [in
A% K: S3 W+ Pdweeby voice] Hi, Question 72. So, I went in, and this was like a two hour lunch, and Jon must have
; e# h/ T( k M! ^/ c4 n% Qthought he was talking to some phenomenal person, because all I was doing was channeling Fred6 ?" G! J( h; ] H+ T: W3 i2 T
Brooks and Ivan Sutherland and Andy Van Dam and people like that. And Henry Fuchs. So it’s pretty
& h, g% E/ A7 G9 C+ oeasy to be smart when you’re parroting smart people. And at the end of the lunch with Jon, I sort) Z$ \) K6 }) q, d5 j V* s$ M# k
of, as we say in the business, made “the ask.” And I said, you know, I have a sabbatical coming up.
/ F% M6 H7 T' S3 L' p' H" P. ^0 c, TAnd he said, what’s that? [laughter] The beginnings of the culture clash. And so I talked with him
6 k. k& p: o3 k# Iabout the possibility of coming there and working with him. And he said, well that’s really good
+ X7 Z# i) g) ~5 R/ V6 b% b ?& Iexcept, you know, you’re in the business of telling people stuff and we’re in the business of keeping% l j. d' @# }9 m6 [8 J( Z
secrets. And then what made Jon Snoddy Jon Snoddy was he said, but we’ll work it out, which I8 b3 h3 S& o7 b5 q
really loved. The other thing that I learned from Jon Snoddy – I could do easily an hour long talk just: b3 W2 c; j( I& J+ I
on what have I learned from Jon Snoddy. One of the things he told me was that wait long enough
" g6 L& J7 [. w3 [3 hand people will surprise and impress you. He said, when you’re pissed off at somebody and you’re
5 S& {* g' ]3 P# w$ Gangry at them, you just haven’t given them enough time. Just give them a little more time and. u8 j; G; C7 R% d; ~
they’ll almost always impress you. And that really stuck with me. I think he’s absolutely right on
' s3 G7 D0 q Z. E+ }4 Sthat one. So to make a long story short, we negotiated a legal contract. It was going to be the first –
5 @ [4 R' \/ _4 Nsome people referred to it as the first and last paper ever published by Imagineering. That the deal. H- J# {6 z l2 f4 ?
was I go, I provide my own funding, I go for six months, I work with a project, we publish a paper.
/ d. ~1 [1 r1 B- j5 r& f& x6 mAnd then we meet our villain. [shows slide of a picture of a former dean of Randy’s] I can’t be all. o- Z6 f z# V3 ]
sweetness and light, because I have no credibility. Somebody’s head’s going to go on a stick. Turns
& ?( b( A; g' W" Qout that the person who gets his head on a stick is a dean back at the University of Virginia. His4 c! a* b, m' R
name is not important. Let’s call him Dean Wormer. [laughter] And Dean Wormer has a meeting$ Q6 Y; {+ n. `/ C. q9 _; }, s; C" g
with me where I say I want to do this sabbatical thing and I’ve actually got the Imagineering guys to
* V5 b2 P( X/ ^/ Olet an academic in, which is insane. I mean if Jon hadn’t gone nuts, this would never have been a
9 \2 I" y ?; W7 C6 F' K' J" m$ zpossibility. This is a very secretive organization. And Dean Wormer looks at the paperwork and he. D; Y \' z6 F4 b% {: J$ ~2 ?
says, well it says they’re going to own your intellectual property. And I said, yeah, we got the
" g2 D1 H0 x# l: C+ w1 V' w) z3 Magreement to publish the paper. There is no other IP. I don’t do patentable stuff. And says, yeah,
) c) b8 [* h7 ?9 xbut you might. And so deal’s off. Just go and get them to change that little clause there and then }& e" U3 L7 ]2 M9 q
come back to me. I’m like, excuse me? And then I said to him, I want you to understand how, \0 ~* d/ X$ I" {4 [0 x) x
important this is. If we can’t work this out, I’m going to take an unpaid leave of absence and I’m just
6 u" o% T, e3 ]1 G* B" xgoing to go there and I’m going to do this thing. And he said, hey, I might not even let you do that. I8 q0 N! t1 C4 x( ^1 }; f
mean you’ve got the IP in your head already and maybe they’re going to suck it out of you, so that’s* y, h- N, |$ p: S( z
not going to fly either. [laughter] It’s very important to know when you’re in a pissing match. And* O w* T6 X L* Y4 n1 ?
it’s very important to get out of it as quickly as possible. So I said to him, well, let’s back off on this.
1 I' U3 T& n2 b' A0 ]! w' jDo we think this is a good idea at all? He said, I have no idea if this is a good idea. I was like,9 e, ]" m# `$ R8 F7 @
[sarcastically] OK, well we’ve got common ground there. Then I said, well is this really your call?- G! o1 G+ G* e4 w. {; r
Isn’t this the call of the Dean of Sponsored Research if it’s an IP issue? And he said, yeah, that’s true.
, E8 {% P$ f# k/ K% [I said, but so if he’s happy you’re happy? [So he says] Yeah, then I’d be fine. Whoosh! Like Wile E.- r% |$ A5 U, o/ H; g0 y c$ c
Coyote, I’m gone in a big ball of dust. And I find myself in Gene Block’s office, who is the most
" x+ w8 l% z$ cfantastic man in the world. And I start talking to Gene Block and I say let’s start at the high level,. T% z8 u) S2 f
since I don’t want to have to back out again. So let’s start at the high level. Do you think this is a8 \) O' X: I5 O9 M d% }
good idea? He said, well if you’re asking me if it’s a good idea, I don’t have very much information.+ M2 u9 ^- P% b- F
All I know is that one of my star faculty members is in my office and he’s really excited, so tell me2 {; |$ X) L9 c7 B$ ^; O
more. Here’s a lesson for everybody in administration. They both said the same thing. But think X! A- E3 ?( {/ c2 z2 W+ o: z
about how they said it, right? [In a loud, barking voice] I don’t know! [In a pleasant voice] Well, I
. P* t" q; K7 Q n5 G1 A# ydon’t have much information, but one of my start faculty members is here and he’s all excited so I% A O6 t1 V3 h) W7 }5 n$ W
want to learn more. They’re both ways of saying I don’t know, but boy there’s a good way and a bad
# a7 T8 P5 e: b# O2 Mway. So anyway, we got it all worked out. I went to Imagineering. Sweetness and light. And all’s+ U5 ?6 m, u% [- k3 U
well that ends well.$ s. {4 ~0 u1 b* T, C
Some brick walls are made of flesh. So I worked on the Aladdin Project. It was absolutely
9 l0 z% y( v+ T% G# dspectacular, I mean just unbelievable. Here’s my nephew Christopher. [Shows slide of Christopher
5 ^# H; \ c' `: Q+ O. con Aladdin apparatus] This was the apparatus. You would sit on this sort of motorcycle-type thing.& Y+ `7 \& \2 P4 u$ Y+ A( T
And you would steer your magic carpet and you would put on the head-mounted display. The headmounted
! ]: q* P) w$ k7 Tdisplay is very interesting because it had two parts, and it was a very clever design. To get
' R: s- T+ T `2 l- Athroughput up, the only part that touched the guest’s head was this little cap and everything else
& D5 Z" y# E: w) e! h4 D6 x0 Pclicked onto it – all the expensive hardware. So you could replicate the caps because they were$ s: a8 _9 [# x0 U' F9 k
basically free to manufacture. [Showing slide of Randy cleaning a cap] And this is what I really did is3 [ L' G4 {0 e9 r- t/ t( U0 N
I was a cap cleaner during the sabbatical. [laughter] I loved Imagineering. It was just a spectacular
O4 B: a0 v9 splace. Just spectacular. Everything that I had dreamed. I loved the model shop. People crawling7 ?/ { S6 C( @+ k9 p
around on things the size of this room that are just big physical models. It was just an incredible
& U ~& {) I6 {9 P5 [; ]2 Uplace to walk around and be inspired. I’m always reminded of when I went there and people said,
3 D0 z$ s) V" ~3 ^# Gdo you think your expectations are too high? And I said, you ever see the movie Charlie and the$ A6 F: i3 w i1 ^8 y8 t* f
Chocolate Factory? Willy Wonka and The Chocolate Factory? Where Gene Wilder says to the little% r/ f; T2 `$ X c" y
boy Charlie, he’s about to give him the chocolate factory. He says “Well Charlie, did anybody ever* _( i. \, r* ]/ r2 _7 }( N
tell you the story of the little boy who suddenly got everything he ever wanted?” Charlie’s eyes get
! X. V2 G9 C$ h/ T! M9 B# l" h y$ Clike saucers and he says, “No, what happened to him?” Gene Wilder says, “He lived happily ever* L- J7 N& q2 o7 ]' X- \
after.” [laughter]% `3 [: H# b2 P1 L. q
OK, so working on the Aladdin VR, I described it as a once in every five careers opportunity, and I
& }# u+ B" C' ?0 E' e+ ustand by that assessment. And it forever changed me. It wasn’t just that it was good work and I got
- B0 ^# O, r9 D; @, E( Bto be a part of it. But it got me into the place of working with real people and real HCI user interface
d. p7 \- E0 }issues. Most HCI people live in this fantasy world of white collar laborers with Ph.D.s and masters/ _) z5 l- E5 A! Q- w
degrees. And you know, until you got ice cream spilled on you, you’re not doing field work. And2 O" ]$ s; t' y H% g
more than anything else, from Jon Snoddy I learned how to put artists and engineers together, and
2 G1 j( H9 q1 Z8 wthat’s been the real legacy.4 ^1 E$ t6 `' c0 C, \8 l7 A
We published a paper. Just a nice academic cultural scandal. When we wrote the paper, the guys at
6 t; l. ~$ c1 W" d1 m) @Imagineering said, well let’s do a nice big picture. Like you would in a magazine. [Showing slide of Y9 a$ `! L' b
first page of the paper, with a photo at the top that spans two columns]. And the SIGGRAPH/ z7 x' q) I% v D) u/ K! |
committee, which accepted the paper, it was like this big scandal. Are they allowed to do that?. c0 x, Z4 e: U; W' N1 {
[laughter] There was no rule! So we published the paper and amazingly since then there’s a$ [4 M/ u7 u) \3 z
tradition of SIGGRAPH papers having color figures on the first page. So I’ve changed the world in a
7 c h( W0 m X8 L) A! s5 Ismall way. [laughter] And then at the end of my six months, they came to me and they said, you0 Q( z" i, ^0 X/ d; U
want to do it for real? You can stay. And I said no. One of the only times in my life I have surprised
1 X; G9 S/ [2 D* Hmy father. He was like, you’re what? He said, since you were, you know [gesturing to height of a
8 o: j3 U* w. e$ Hchild’s head],this is all you wanted, and now that you got it, and you’re… huh? There was a bottle of" Z& _ N; G3 W
Maalox in my desk drawer. Be careful what you wish for. It was a particularly stressful place.& o. X c; k' {
Imagineering in general is actually not so Maalox-laden, but the lab I was in – oh, Jon left in the7 b; {& t4 L3 V: D" \
middle. And it was a lot like the Soviet Union. It was a little dicey for awhile. But it worked out OK., C1 H" `8 j( T) i3 }
And if they had said, stay here or never walk in the building again, I would have done it. I would
7 i% [ o w1 l' e; b' K2 dhave walked away from tenure, I would have just done it. But they made it easy on me. They said
" N0 i2 E9 q$ C, L% z" L6 Hyou can have your cake and eat it too. And I basically became a day-a-week consultant for& M& d; j. G( \) x
Imagineering, and I did that for about ten years. And that’s one of the reasons you should all3 Y" n8 }- m( e7 u0 i E2 K
become professors. Because you can have your cake and eat it too.
& c! X3 ?) E" j- ~I went and consulted on things like DisneyQuest. So there was the Virtual Jungle Cruise. And the
' d% z4 i- A- obest interactive experience I think ever done, and Jesse Schell gets the credit for this, Pirates of the, |) U+ }: n7 }3 X
Caribbean. Wonderful at DisneyQuest.
7 k+ I* F& a/ W: n# i2 z4 `- |8 s9 y! cAnd so those are my childhood dreams. And that’s pretty good. I felt good about that. So then the4 J' V; e3 G) h: ?# Y
question becomes, how can I enable the childhood dreams of others. And again, boy am I glad I E; I' ?+ n. F7 W2 \9 h0 `5 e
became a professor. What better place to enable childhood dreams? Eh, maybe working at EA, I c7 q5 b0 D' p; a6 j" v+ M, c" F3 ^
don’t know. That’d probably be a good close second. And this started in a very concrete realization
/ `0 p! h( T; w. X" mthat I could do this, because a young man named Tommy Burnett, when I was at the University of- |* X! E6 [& z3 j- `
Virginia, came to me, was interested in joining my research group. And we talked about it, and he
* T- O0 J8 A1 e/ p& a% asaid, oh, and I have a childhood dream. It gets pretty easy to recognize them when they tell you./ K4 ~, M+ ]/ E/ ]" T7 o& L1 R2 c
And I said, yes, Tommy, what is your childhood dream? He said, I want to work on the next Star4 T; Q; {8 h0 a; A. ~
Wars film. Now you got to remember the timing on this. Where is Tommy, Tommy is here today.
b2 H4 h9 A; R: U% fWhat year would this have been? Your sophomore year.8 r1 H, u2 T! S: a2 L
Tommy:/ x5 l9 y! m2 d( o4 u
It was around ’93.
9 T: k/ o9 M6 K: m8 M7 BRandy Pausch:
* [0 ~$ e3 W8 |& PAre you breaking anything back there young man? OK, all right, so in 1993. And I said to Tommy,
# C9 G% x' i8 N+ u* d# c! W" {$ xyou know they’re probably not going to make those next movies. [laughter] And he said, no, THEY
4 D. L& L/ P% A* U; ^+ G* ~ARE. And Tommy worked with me for a number of years as an undergraduate and then as a staff
# Q4 N# L/ d: j l8 ?4 _member, and then I moved to Carnegie Mellon, every single member of my team came from Virginia
/ L% f& d- Z2 E2 sto Carnegie Mellon except for Tommy because he got a better offer. And he did indeed work on all
7 L* M5 ?; s' fthree of those films. And then I said, well that’s nice, but you know, one at a time is kind of
; ~+ _& f/ f; X: Y! D, dinefficient. And people who know me know that I’m an efficiency freak. So I said, can I do this in2 j0 k, P6 g/ w' R0 S# C! q5 J
mass? Can I get people turned in such a way that they can be turned onto their childhood dreams?
6 `% Y0 u- k3 J# S& Q3 y2 |And I created a course, I came to Carnegie Mellon and I created a course called Building Virtual6 U) t- [. X0 k( ~1 I+ N' e4 E" J
Worlds. It’s a very simple course. How many people here have ever been to any of the shows?
& N. O' n( D8 `[Some people from audience raise hands] OK, so some of you have an idea. For those of you who
5 ^- ]( J$ p1 D" V G( F0 W' G6 F' |don’t, the course is very simple. There are 50 students drawn from all the different departments of
2 W( P) T2 m# L j/ Y0 C! h% zthe university. There are randomly chosen teams, four people per team, and they change every
" Q! u6 C" \2 `8 A, K: r& f) ^& Lproject. A project only lasts two weeks, so you do something, you make something, you show
5 _0 @1 @/ ^( _! t6 P2 W4 tsomething, then I shuffle the teams, you get three new playmates and you do it again. And it’s% {8 y0 Y( u* Y/ H# |! M! l8 D
every two weeks, and so you get five projects during the semester. The first year we taught this
. |; @* L% i/ g8 }course, it is impossible to describe how much of a tiger by the tail we had. I was just running the0 ?3 a6 V( o* i
course because I wanted to see if we could do it. We had just learned how to do texture mapping& l' `6 @) A7 N, N
on 3D graphics, and we could make stuff that looked half decent. But you know, we were running
$ p- R4 g- H4 s" {; S, g7 ion really weak computers, by current standards. But I said I’ll give it a try. And at my new university
+ N3 U) @) a# I) r( }4 a, T[Carnegie Mellon] I made a couple of phone calls, and I said I want to cross-list this course to get all1 D7 B- X1 j; m6 C: J- P4 ]* Z
these other people. And within 24 hours it was cross-listed in five departments. I love this8 G0 n% N( W4 i, M: M
university. I mean it’s the most amazing place. And the kids said, well what content do we make? I6 {+ J9 K' Z- ^
said, hell, I don’t know. You make whatever you want. Two rules: no shooting violence and no
: U3 q# v1 N& G* cpornography. Not because I’m opposed to those in particular, but you know, that’s been done with
) }4 U5 e6 r9 E. p- Y8 BVR, right? [laughter] And you’d be amazed how many 19-year-old boys are completely out of ideas( N- j5 t; o! h0 d7 |* b
when you take those off the table. [laughter and clapping]
9 D! F3 K* ?: ^6 sAnyway, so I taught the course. The first assignment, I gave it to them, they came back in two
: G* M9 w* S0 ~; s8 g* ?weeks and they just blew me away. I mean the work was so beyond, literally, my imagination,
\' W! ~, X" J# t+ ^5 R) g7 ibecause I had copied the process from Imagineering’s VR lab, but I had no idea what they could or
1 s$ F: I% J7 \! s, t- fcouldn’t do with it as undergraduates, and their tools were weaker, and they came back on the first! V3 N; C. M# D: \
assignment, and they did something that was so spectacular that I literally didn’t, ten years as a# ^" p! y/ M6 Y( `- N& O
professor and I had no idea what to do next. So I called up my mentor, and I called up Andy Van
# d1 g+ m9 D" ?, E. YDam. And I said, Andy, I just gave a two-week assignment, and they came back and did stuff that if I3 t9 b i$ A c0 \
had given them a whole semester I would have given them all As. Sensei, what do I do? [laughter]
7 S; ^6 u5 Q) K4 M4 u7 ?6 u7 ~: SAnd Andy thought for a minute and he said, you go back into class tomorrow and you look them in5 d1 J _5 T$ g! \, k
the eye and you say, “Guys, that was pretty good, but I know you can do better.” [laughter] And that
6 |8 w$ Z3 U" gwas exactly the right advice. Because what he said was, you obviously don’t know where the bar9 ^+ ?: p8 _1 ~( ~ V' g
should be, and you’re only going to do them a disservice by putting it anywhere. And boy was that3 s3 R# C! |7 ]/ v8 [, }
good advice because they just kept going. And during that semester it became this underground
0 U6 a6 `' F2 T& A s& @thing. I’d walk into a class with 50 students in it and there were 95 people in the room. Because it
2 ], a. @0 d; Z; ]was the day we were showing work. And people’s roommates and friends and parents – I’d never E! n' Q3 G9 a2 g# D1 T
had parents come to class before! It was flattering and somewhat scary. And so it snowballed and' _5 m& p7 `2 Y( |4 D) h1 a) _
we had this bizarre thing of, well we’ve got to share this. If there’s anything I’ve been raised to do,/ k. ]7 q( Q# M
it’s to share, and I said, we’ve got to show this at the end of the semester. We’ve got to have a big
8 g! `4 ^ ~& ]3 B" g' I" H; `show. And we booked this room, McConomy. I have a lot of good memories in this room. And we# I2 d7 [- ^9 Z/ p! v% t, Y
booked it not because we thought we could fill it, but because it had the only AV setup that would# r* o9 j! B7 }8 V
work, because this was a zoo. Computers and everything. And then we filled it. And we more than6 W# e0 e9 F% q8 _% F \" Q$ J4 U( j* i
filled it. We had people standing in the aisle. I will never forget the dean at the time, Jim Morris$ |, h/ Y7 }/ Z4 X& a
was sitting on the stage right about there. We had to kind of scoot him out of the way. And the
8 L0 |- ?+ {: {! B( O% |! n& J6 Senergy in the room was like nothing I had ever experienced before. And President Cohen, Jerry' S; P% Y! ?* }7 j( X
Cohen was there, and he sensed the same thing. He later described it as like an Ohio State football/ J8 T& f: `' S; C; N
pep rally. Except for academics. And he came over and he asked exactly the right question. He
3 t0 A3 K: e$ f8 n. ~2 F& q! zsaid, before you start, he said, where are these people from? He said, the audience, what# F, o8 X. @' }0 |: F6 {
departments are they from? And we polled them and it was all the departments. And I felt very
Z; {$ U! w- J5 d* y! |8 E; Mgood because I had just come to campus, he had just come to campus, and my new boss had seen in* p; ^/ ]* x8 {# D6 l
a very corporal way that this is the university that puts everybody together. And that made me feel
- X' p& U5 s4 t" E" r/ u/ V+ Vjust tremendous.( d' t$ D4 f! Z# U) p
So we did this campus-wide exhibition. People performed down here. They’re in costume, and we
5 c3 d( } [0 W4 O7 t6 ]- Mproject just like this and you can see what’s going on. You can see what they’re seeing in the head# a4 F& _! P Y. H+ q$ Y
mount. There’s a lot of big props, so there’s a guy white water rafting. [shows slides of a BVW show]
3 \4 [0 m7 @+ u2 A% vThis is Ben in E.T. And yes, I did tell them if they didn’t do the shot of the kids biking across the
* ?+ X1 N+ f1 B& i+ a: g5 Lmoon I would fail him. That is a true story. And I thought I’d show you just one world, and if we can! A2 @- K9 v- J8 e2 Q$ U
get the lights down if that’s at all possible. No, ok, that means no. All right. All right we’ll just do
* ?( s" z$ i. g: P. n9 Tour best then. [Shows “Hello.world” world done in the BVW class, audience applauds at the end.] It
L* W. s3 F! Y' Z9 W5 ], \2 ewas an unusual course. With some of the most brilliant, creative students from all across the4 q% U5 t6 e2 T8 @
campus. It just was a joy to be involved. And they took the whole stage performance aspect of this
6 f" Q1 {, Z7 {0 z& m" i! ]2 Lway too seriously [shows pictures of very strange costumes students wore]. And it became this
F2 q- F& d3 F9 L. l- S2 ecampus phenomenon every year. People would line up for it. It was very flattering. And it gave kids
0 @6 N J" Z/ P! D9 Z8 na sense of excitement of putting on a show for people who were excited about it. And I think that: ~2 V* j0 x% C1 C4 C5 r' Y! r
that’s one of the best things you can give somebody – the chance to show them what it feels like to
, x4 Y" r* e- Z3 t4 L) omake other people get excited and happy. I mean that’s a tremendous gift. We always try to$ ]& E0 H# s1 W' `0 X, ~: ~
involve the audience. Whether it was people with glow sticks or batting a beach ball around… or5 U l0 z3 {* k/ Z1 F; p0 f, r
driving [shows photo of audience members leaning in their seats to steer a car]. This is really cool.
/ [& g* C4 \ uThis technology actually got used at the Spiderman 3 premiere in L.A., so the audience was+ H R4 A3 T( {) ?% B0 w
controlling something on the screen, so that’s kind of nice. And I don’t have a class picture from
; S- X1 H) E0 h5 S5 oevery year, but I dredged all the ones that I do have, and all I can say is that what a privilege and an3 f( C Q* M6 H) ?0 M' F
honor it was to teach that course for something like ten years.
& B3 a4 `% J# ~5 u$ AAnd all good things come to an end. And I stopped teaching that course about a year ago. People
, E- L: u0 c0 v- Zalways ask me what was my favorite moment. I don’t know if you could have a favorite moment.0 i! s" K# O7 x
But boy there is one I’ll never forget. This was a world with, I believe a roller skating ninja. And one
5 {: _- Z- t+ `' J/ D( E% C% E0 \of the rules was that we perform these things live and they all had to really work. And the moment7 r' t. P5 z1 g0 Z _
it stopped working, we went to your backup videotape. And this was very embarrassing. [Shows/ J3 Z$ ^9 I( @8 V; g
image of Roller Ninja world presentation] So we have this ninja on stage and he’s doing this roller0 z; g5 y, O7 N& G& M. H, y
skating thing and the world, it did not crash gently. Whoosh. And I come out, and I believe it was
. _9 J, W$ U' V8 b' y+ j6 RSteve, Audia, wasn’t it? Where is he? OK, where is Steve? Ah, my man. Steve Audia. And talk2 a& [( M, G! C
about quick on your feet. I say, Steve, I’m sorry but your world has crashed and we’re going to go to& {+ J0 o. Y4 G2 x8 \8 O8 _
videotape. And he pulls out his ninja sword and says, I am dishonored! Whaaa! And just drops!
- A0 ^& A$ f0 ^/ I( _6 `* x+ J" v[applause and laughter] And so I think it’s very telling that my very favorite moment in ten years of
% [3 r; X6 P7 Z7 J, w7 Gthis high technology course was a brilliant ad lib. And then when the videotape is done and the
7 R% p0 g. }+ ~; wlights come up, he’s lying there lifeless and his teammates drag him off! [laughter] It really was a
; \. {+ J- ^2 q% k8 U9 Zfantastic moment.
) F& D4 t% }: T) d4 u3 B' kAnd the course was all about bonding. People used to say, you know, what’s going to make for a' N; n& |5 x. q1 H
good world? I said, I can’t tell you beforehand, but right before they present it I can tell you if the
" Y+ \* D# l/ y9 }% b: Hworld’s good just by the body language. If they’re standing close to each other, the world is good.
5 y' ]- Z& `, y ^5 L0 c' S3 ZAnd BVW was a pioneering course [Randy puts on vest with arrows poking out of the back], and I
9 c, T; S! W8 k, M9 z! V7 Awon’t bore you with all the details, but it wasn’t easy to do, and I was given this when I stepped z w! v9 ]! J9 v0 z
down from the ETC and I think it’s emblematic. If you’re going to do anything that pioneering you
4 X5 {% b6 [6 s' `6 U" j4 D4 P$ Uwill get those arrows in the back, and you just have to put up with it. I mean everything that could4 Q! F8 J( ]9 W+ \& @* R
go wrong did go wrong. But at the end of the day, a whole lot of people had a whole lot of fun.2 H( D% k: X$ W1 S" F7 e
When you’ve had something for ten years that you hold so precious, it’s the toughest thing in the
3 ]) D7 } ]7 H7 e+ hworld to hand it over. And the only advice I can give you is, find somebody better than you to hand
6 Q( \& q* V- e: x% e! K1 N( A; Fit to. And that’s what I did. There was this kid at the VR studios way back when, and you didn’t have
# y; s! q. Q0 f/ k; C8 ^& wto spend very long in Jesse Schell’s orbit to go, the force is strong in this one. And one of my# a8 V% R i2 P
greatest – my two greatest accomplishments I think for Carnegie Mellon was that I got Jessica# I; Z8 V+ E6 J' O! m# M6 Y1 V
Hodgins and Jesse Schell to come here and join our faculty. And I was thrilled when I could hand this' @/ w7 P6 H4 t, e; ~8 g5 {" ~
over to Jesse, and to no one’s surprise, he has really taken it up to the next notch. And the course is' @& D$ b1 o$ V, t& [% a6 r
in more than good hands – it’s in better hands. But it was just one course. And then we really took* X* h4 c* N7 P8 \7 F
it up a notch. And we created what I would call the dream fulfillment factory. Don Marinelli and I
: o' ?- U1 n/ e1 zgot together and with the university’s blessing and encouragement, we made this thing out of whole
7 U) w( J0 D. [& z I3 Zcloth that was absolutely insane. Should never have been tried. All the sane universities didn’t go3 ^% n& [1 |, v- m5 C
near this kind of stuff. Creating a tremendous opportunistic void. So the Entertainment Technology# L/ g- G/ f3 e' l5 E' q/ e1 `
Center was all about artists and technologists working in small teams to make things. It was a twoyear! T; n% h y" n
professional master’s degree. And Don and I were two kindred spirits. We’re very different –
( \0 ]3 l7 f8 p4 `# S! C/ banybody who knows us knows that we are very different people. And we liked to do things in a new6 E x4 Z, F, u
way, and the truth of the matter is that we are both a little uncomfortable in academia. I used to
) t5 [5 `+ O+ ]5 p- D& L1 h* Vsay that I am uncomfortable as an academic because I come from a long line of people who actually
3 S8 e' D, _2 ~2 l, Iworked for a living, so. [Nervous laughter] I detect nervous laughter! And I want to stress, Carnegie
5 B7 o6 ^- _0 I% h9 f! kMellon is the only place in the world that the ETC could have happened. By far the only place.
0 Z% g: f1 j: K* a[Shows slide of Don Marinelli in tye-dyed shirt, shades and an electric guitar, sitting on a desk next0 G! Y( Z5 c6 ]- @. b. `/ j- q
to Randy, wearing nerd glasses, button-up shirt, staring at a laptop. Above their heads were the
5 M* r4 y. ~( b- x5 R' s9 Ulabels “Right brain/Left brain”] [laughter] OK, this picture was Don’s idea, OK? And we like to refer
$ F7 I& L! U" m9 Nto this picture as Don Marinelli on guitar and Randy Pausch on keyboards. [laughter] But we really
: q) b* }4 L; |0 cdid play up the left brain, right brain and it worked out really well that way. [Shows slide of Don4 }2 u# U ~- V* E
looking intense] Don is an intense guy. And Don and I shared an office, and at first it was a small1 r$ y7 P! }2 ]$ E. K
office. We shared an office for six years. You know, those of you who know Don know he’s an- B* B* N: W d
intense guy. And you know, given my current condition, somebody was asking me … this is a
( Z# R0 x' L# C N+ C- _5 Xterrible joke, but I’m going to use it anyway. Because I know Don will forgive me. Somebody said,
( x" \, o1 r a8 \/ y0 Kgiven your current condition, have you thought about whether you’re going to go to heaven or hell?. V u' G$ j% n. r" d/ m
And I said, I don’t know, but if I’m going to hell, I’m due six years for time served! [laughter] I kid.
% {6 a, A/ @6 V, K+ T; j# y$ ESharing an office with Don was really like sharing an office with a tornado. There was just so much, f9 q7 T( |9 n, F: Q
energy and you never knew which trailer was next, right? But you know something exciting was# V0 W1 J1 {$ a+ H( \& r; Z
going to happen. And there was so much energy, and I do believe in giving credit where credit is2 C) Y* z. O6 q6 d1 j
due. So in my typically visual way, if Don and I were to split the success for the ETC, he clearly gets
s+ `2 B h5 R/ qthe lion’s share of it. [Shows image of a pie chart divided 70/30 (Don/Randy) ] He did the lion’s share
7 \, ]: Z: b/ S; U8 iof the work, ok, he had the lion’s share of the ideas. It was a great teamwork. I think it was a great
1 N1 J( T& F- l4 u1 O, k; yyin and a yang, but it was more like YIN and yang. And he deserves that credit and I give it to him
! k- {2 Q5 y. h! Obecause the ETC is a wonderful place. And he’s now running it and he’s taking it global. We’ll talk
3 f. E8 c7 J2 Z H3 @about that in a second.7 G1 y3 b, L) ?$ l3 J1 v
Describing the ETC is really hard, and I finally found a metaphor. Telling people about the ETC is like- j9 |' k- S) ?1 R% V8 t
describing Cirque du Soleil if they’ve never seen it. Sooner or later you’re going to make the
- U2 E# a9 c v1 s2 |! ]mistake. You’re going to say, well it’s like a circus. And then you’re dragged into this conversation& D: E0 b# h, M9 p
about oh, how many tigers, how many lions, how many trapeze acts? And that misses the whole- }6 X, {& Y/ w9 Q. P& y* b% w
point. So when we say we’re a master’s degree, we’re really not like any master’s degree you’ve3 ^1 l$ r+ j# L
ever seen. Here’s the curriculum [Shows slide of ETC curriculum, listing “Project Course” as the only
- S1 W2 S1 a6 H% Ecourse each semester; audience laughs] The curriculum ended up looking like this. [shows slightly
/ ~- a" y) @, [5 t# dmore detailed slide]. All I want to do is visually communicate to you that you do five projects in
9 L8 V/ ^8 ?. FBuilding Virtual Worlds, then you do three more. All of your time is spent in small teams making
1 w/ O: _/ B2 }2 }' \) W7 ^ t) istuff. None of that book learning thing. Don and I had no patience for the book learning thing. It’s% B, Z& R7 R/ d3 i1 l: Q
a master’s degree. They already spent four years doing book learning. By now they should have
! K v& l( y3 Rread all the books.
5 C& a: v9 r: j# J, `$ y8 \The keys to success were that Carnegie Mellon gave us the reins. Completely gave us the reins. We" B* s% B+ {/ b# u) H
had no deans to report to. We reported directly to the provost, which is great because the provost
& r' K0 g7 f6 }is way too busy to watch you carefully. [laughter] We were given explicit license to break the mold.
5 P b" r0 n- N/ g7 ?It was all project based. It was intense, it was fun, and we took field trips! Every spring semester in1 J- {6 Q' f" K: B, J3 ]
January, we took all 50 students in the first year class and we’d take them out to Pixar, Industrial3 V4 J: H( r. c- O, D0 D
Light and Magic, and of course when you’ve got guys like Tommy there acting as host, right, it’s
; X9 i) L( Z) ~pretty easy to get entrée to these places. So we did things very, very differently. The kind of7 T4 a4 e" z0 k4 D
projects students would do, we did a lot of what we’d call edutainment.
, @, H1 r, x4 h+ {/ M1 K( eWe developed a bunch of things with the Fire Department of New York, a network simulator for5 \0 T$ e% R! U
training firefighters, using video game-ish type technology to teach people useful things. That’s not! Y ]" t7 s/ D8 d6 J; L O5 N9 S
bad. Companies did this strange thing. They put in writing, we promise to hire your students. I’ve
: `$ C: P9 G, B2 v- ngot the EA and Activision ones here. I think there are now, how many, five? Drew knows I bet.) J3 G) ?4 b$ g2 `" o) b6 Q
[Drew Davison, head of ETC-Pittsburgh, gestures with five fingers]. So there are five written
$ X/ r! P# Y! a( T% E( K' Nagreements. I don’t know of any other school that has this kind of written agreement with any9 A/ _$ k, E" u/ H/ w ~
company. And so that’s a real statement. And these are multiple year things, so they’re agreeing to
* t* I" T8 U# l; T) o6 v6 P phire people for summer internships that we have not admitted yet. That’s a pretty strong statement
6 d \3 x* J: c* _. Z& C6 W$ Jabout the quality of the program. And Don, as I said, he’s now, he’s crazy. In a wonderful/ i. |' }' ^7 ~
complimentary way. He’s doing these things where I’m like, oh my god. He’s not here tonight
. @$ P& F6 T% E& n# X3 cbecause he’s in Singapore because there’s going to be an ETC campus in Singapore. There’s already3 `' O5 g) S* ~% G' A
on in Australia and there’s going to be on in Korea. So this is becoming a global phenomenon. So I1 Q6 ~$ s. m5 b* S2 D* R
think this really speaks volumes about all the other universities. It’s really true that Carnegie Mellon
2 ]# ]7 X% D$ n1 g2 q+ [7 Kis the only university that can do this. We just have to do it all over the world now.
p( R1 V; U0 D" Z" r& SOne other big success about the ETC is teaching people about feedback [puts up bar chart where
# X/ ] z6 Q' O) l# k5 V3 Gstudents are (anonymous) listed on a scale labeled “how easy to work with” ] -- oh I hear the
_, X1 A7 |4 r* O- jnervous laughter from the students. I had forgotten the delayed shock therapy effect of these bar
3 r6 ^% E$ [% a* R! P/ Xcharts. When you’re taking Building Virtual Worlds, every two weeks we get peer feedback. We put- P- h, @ m( o; Z7 ~% }
that all into a big spreadsheet and at the end of the semester, you had three teammates per project,
# x! n, e$ q. ~$ k0 M, ~five projects, that’s 15 data points, that’s statistically valid. And you get a bar chart telling you on a: x( I7 A7 C: V
ranking of how easy you are to work with, where you stacked up against your peers. Boy that’s hard5 D# n7 |+ W% r, ?( r. U2 x( J
feedback to ignore. Some still managed. [laughter] But for the most part, people looked at that and4 o7 i1 f. Q5 s2 `! ~$ C7 w: I
went, wow, I’ve got to take it up a notch. I better start thinking about what I’m saying to people in
% x4 H9 I: V8 V% b3 wthese meetings. And that is the best gift an educator can give is to get somebody to become self# S: v; K6 H$ r# i- d9 T5 P. r
reflective.
! c( N0 N; \& `So the ETC was wonderful, but even the ETC and even as Don scales it around the globe, it’s still very- F/ I# v1 a. \+ Z
labor intensive, you know. It’s not Tommy one-at-a-time. It’s not a research group ten at a time.( ?' Q) L* ?3 R1 _
It’s 50 or 100 at a time per campus times four campuses. But I wanted something infinitely scalable./ R% L( I! T8 C/ F+ g9 y* b4 @! w- v
Scalable to the point where millions or tens of millions of people could chase their dreams with2 q# u. L( S/ A+ y( r2 W2 w' Q5 w
something. And you know, I guess that kind of a goal really does make me the Mad Hatter. [Puts on
8 ^' X2 f( @" k! U" m: i( c$ D- D0 Ba Mad Hatter’s green top hat]. So Alice is a project that we worked on for a long, long time. It’s a: y+ N2 M# G# C1 h$ ~8 }0 m
novel way to teach computer programming. Kids make movies and games. The head fake – again,
$ v' i7 {' m, k0 J" S0 [6 nwe’re back to the head fakes. The best way to teach somebody something is to have them think
, O. E/ O9 {4 E* e0 \they’re learning something else. I’ve done it my whole career. And the head fake here is that$ K, A, D) K) @6 s
they’re learning to program but they just think they’re making movies and video games. This thing
: ]1 m0 _) Q1 y; n! U, r0 E) Nhas already been downloaded well over a million times. There are eight textbooks that have been) w0 ^+ Q3 z; G. \
written about it. Ten percent of U.S. colleges are using it now. And it’s not the good stuff yet. The3 h8 r; o0 J1 r3 q5 J
good stuff is coming in the next version. I, like Moses, get to see the promised land, but I won’t get
" \% s) J+ \9 y( fto set foot in it. And that’s OK, because I can see it. And the vision is clear. Millions of kids having: j/ y9 q+ n) h6 G C* I
fun while learning something hard. That’s pretty cool. I can deal with that as a legacy. The next
: p! A0 P6 j8 |9 eversion’s going to come out in 2008. It’s going to be teaching the Java language if you want them to
9 |2 ^( k4 v$ @& ~0 C4 B( \know they’re learning Java. Otherwise they’ll just think that they’re writing movie scripts. And0 Z: \5 v. K7 j7 ]- k) }- ]
we’re getting the characters from the bestselling PC video game in history, The Sims. And this is1 K( P& l1 W; H+ }+ k! r) N! c; x$ }
already working in the lab, so there’s no real technological risk. I don’t have time to thank and
% |% r( n% K' x7 R; r! M/ I4 b! ], Rmention everybody in the Alice team, but I just want to say that Dennis Cosgrove is going to be
( _* ]0 H! ?% k4 V- Q/ Ibuilding this, has been building this. He is the designer. This is his baby. And for those of you who
. U/ n5 D5 v. Hare wondering, well, in some number of months who should I be emailing about the Alice project,( P) F4 d' O& E3 n
where’s Wanda Dann? Oh, there you are. Stand up, let them all see you. Everybody say, Hi Wanda.: z, C$ E9 S4 |& v$ `. Q( H
Audience:
) k& c0 j) e, j& i. v9 K: b1 }Hi, Wanda.1 S, P% {" l+ A" S* z' \
Randy Pausch:- g8 l. I* A$ h* C4 I
Send her the email. And I’ll talk a little bit more about Caitlin Kelleher, but she’s graduated with her
8 Z3 L( d2 B1 ^6 S8 A1 NPh.D., and she’s at Washington University, and she’s going to be taking this up a notch and going to3 t0 G. J( _' ?# P
middle schools with it. So, grand vision and to the extent that you can live on in something, I will; [9 b2 P* M. h# O' x' U( j
live on in Alice.
4 r: d( _) {! Q) X2 NAll right, so now the third part of the talk. Lessons learned. We’ve talked about my dreams. We’ve
' z- v; l+ ]4 E( J/ d; B! u0 ytalked about helping other people enable their dreams. Somewhere along the way there’s got to be
8 ?8 \( {: G! vsome aspect of what lets you get to achieve your dreams. First one is the rule of parents, mentors( X8 V. u1 ]: j) S! n' z3 _7 ^
and students. I was blessed to have been born to two incredible people. This is my mother on her
, h' R B, k' @3 C. V) S# k70th birthday. [Shows slide of Randy’s mom driving a race car on an amusement park race course]4 M I3 w- Y4 _$ W8 X$ D, }
[laughter] I am back here. I have just been lapped. [laughter] This is my dad riding a roller coaster0 ?" u# V: e6 j, `3 X$ Z
on his 80th birthday. [Shows slide of dad] And he points out that he’s not only brave, he’s talented
. ? V' X1 `7 @$ @. Vbecause he did win that big bear the same day. My dad was so full of life, anything with him was an
) y7 X0 u2 x8 R E- F" S- Gadventure. [Shows picture of his Dad holding a brown paper bag.] I don’t know what’s in that bag,5 V t- W% s3 A% F6 Z S- i
but I know it’s cool. My dad dressed up as Santa Claus, but he also did very, very significant things$ H% C+ L" E9 d( W' _! y
to help lots of people. This is a dormitory in Thailand that my mom and dad underwrote. And every
8 V7 p) ~( }# f2 u) F8 b) Byear about 30 students get to go to school who wouldn’t have otherwise. This is something my wife( L8 @* l5 |# {7 u& Z
and I have also been involved in heavily. And these are the kind of things that I think everybody
) c s( M3 G5 H" R3 }" `5 yought to be doing. Helping others.2 N- h' o4 d1 ?7 U; u
But the best story I have about my dad – unfortunately my dad passed away a little over a year ago7 {6 q* u6 V) @1 L
– and when we were going through his things, he had fought in World War II in the Battle of the9 _- \! S/ \; Q' |
Bulge, and when we were going through his things, we found out he had been awarded the Bronze
1 I2 b& P& S; n9 u" W/ t! mStar for Valor. My mom didn’t know it. In 50 years of marriage it had just never come up.
& ^! W$ N7 P3 `0 q7 o8 e1 |! q7 VMy mom. [Shows picture of Randy as a young child, pulling his Mom’s hair]. Mothers are people9 ?) h3 D: T/ _' k' b0 A: a
who love even when you pull their hair. And I have two great mom stories. When I was here6 h3 P" I/ a) @1 z2 w1 g/ ~
studying to get my Ph.D. and I was taking something called the theory qualifier, which I can; W% s; I& ~8 N+ { s9 J& i9 x# x, C4 I
definitively say is the second worst thing in my life after chemotherapy. [laughter] And I was
: c- O2 S6 C# D9 `/ E9 Ycomplaining to my mother about how hard this test was and how awful it was, and she just leaned5 L* @' r# D: `" U
over and she patted me on the arm and she said, we know how you feel honey, and remember when$ e4 z3 z5 R' a! Y: g9 v/ Q
your father was your age he was fighting the Germans. [laugher] After I got my Ph.D., my mother
& E- Q& s% [' k$ A4 [took great relish in introducing me as, this is my son, he’s a doctor but not the kind that helps people.
" N# L5 r. |8 J% K8 @5 Q2 {[laughter] These slides are a little bit dark [meaning “hard to see”], but when I was in high school I9 i! j" t- f( d8 G" p, u
decided to paint my bedroom. [shows slides of bedroom] I always wanted a submarine and an! V8 ?- _1 Q" E
elevator. And the great thing about this [shows slide of quadratic formula painted on wall]
1 T6 P% Y6 p# _( @+ z- K[interrupted by laughter] – what can I say? And the great thing about this is they let me do it. And- ]! g$ O0 ?, i3 e1 v) a2 x" I
they didn’t get upset about it. And it’s still there. If you go to my parent’s house it’s still there. And _; z2 U* |# X
anybody who is out there who is a parent, if your kids want to paint their bedroom, as a favor to me$ B' F8 n/ _- l
let them do it. It’ll be OK. Don’t worry about resale value on the house.
( U: ?/ q/ {: zOther people who help us besides our parents: our teachers, our mentors, our friends, our
+ _9 b3 Q: p8 u# E" W, bcolleagues. God, what is there to say about Andy Van Dam? When I was a freshman at Brown, he
9 E- ~1 s5 p# y+ P# {was on leave. And all I heard about was this Andy Van Dam. He was like a mythical creature. Like a, O% k) @5 [. E A3 G3 y% Y
centaur, but like a really pissed off centaur. And everybody was like really sad that he was gone, but4 d$ p, K" }* N$ D. Z
kind of more relaxed? And I found out why. Because I started working for Andy. I was a teaching+ C# V% i8 J5 n
assistant for him as a sophomore. And I was quite an arrogant young man. And I came in to some, d2 z, ~) X) |# G+ ~" C
office hours and of course it was nine o’clock at night and Andy was there at office hours, which is: Y5 A9 N8 Z( X
your first clue as to what kind of professor he was. And I come bounding in and you know, I’m just+ d; h, R7 V3 j
I’m going to save the world. There’re all these kids waiting for help, da da, da da, da da, da da, da7 {& ?+ u6 V3 x8 T6 F
da. And afterwards, Andy literally Dutch-uncled – he’s Dutch, right? He Dutch-uncled me. And he
7 S- F9 ]2 m4 t( f6 M2 tput his arm around my shoulders and we went for a little walk and he said, Randy, it’s such a shame& w( u7 i5 f4 @1 K H; ]# |
that people perceive you as so arrogant. Because it’s going to limit what you’re going to be able to
' p3 [- o, R9 Z. R8 c: Zaccomplish in life. What a hell of a way to word “you’re being a jerk.” [laughter] Right? He doesn’t
" m L: ~/ S5 j" }say you’re a jerk. He says people are perceiving you this way and he says the downside is it’s going
1 E5 B' p1 Z5 b. i( F6 i. l5 E; Sto limit what you’re going to be able to accomplish.
* i4 v. P0 {0 a$ E: m$ YWhen I got to know Andy better, the beatings became more direct, but. [laughter] I could tell you
9 g, |$ e$ m wAndy stories for a month, but the one I will tell you is that when it came time to start thinking about
. h" p. A) H0 f- X4 t9 l& vwhat to do about graduating from Brown, it had never occurred to me in a million years to go to
. B# u" M8 f' `+ {6 v# v" n+ Ograduate school. Just out of my imagination. It wasn’t the kind of thing people from my family did.: L$ B: m: X& {+ T2 [2 ^' a
We got, say, what do you call them? …. jobs. And Andy said, no, don’t go do that. Go get a Ph.D.
4 o$ j9 E7 A; Z2 L1 [Become a professor. And I said, why? And he said, because you’re such a good salesman that any
( y- P( i9 x( }) O. V) {company that gets you is going to use you as a salesman. And you might as well be selling
$ x& D3 @) E$ d0 K' N( S5 isomething worthwhile like education. [long pause, looks directly at Andy van Dam] Thanks.
8 j* [5 m% t6 r+ e- tAndy was my first boss, so to speak. I was lucky enough to have a lot of bosses. [shows slide of
; ^* X# G" s7 Pvarious bosses] That red circle is way off. Al is over here. [laughter] I don’t know what the hell
8 ]; ]( S: Y9 r! L& C2 Qhappened there. He’s probably watching this on the webcast going, my god he’s targeting and he6 a5 r- N( v& h' {
still can’t aim! [laughter] I don’t want to say much about the great bosses I’ve had except that they0 M& o' O" v2 Y* q2 @9 J" _- L
were great. And I know a lot of people in the world that have had bad bosses, and I haven’t had to
0 a! O4 u( e0 @6 S0 M" sendure that experience and I’m very grateful to all the people that I ever had to have worked for.
# O5 @5 z& H! S6 E/ }( TThey have just been incredible.% X# F% s3 C1 h: o+ F1 o( t
But it’s not just our bosses, we learn from our students. I think the best head fake of all time comes
1 F# j) z! X8 W1 Q1 g1 ifrom Caitlin Kelleher. Excuse me, Doctor Caitlin Kelleher, who just finished up here and is starting at
! P4 }7 A+ c, \Washington University, and she looked at Alice when it was an easier way to learn to program, and
* z" m# \6 u+ ^6 E* Y" l A! Kshe said, yeah, but why is that fun? I was like, ‘cause uh, I’m a compulsive male…I like to make the
4 m3 X! @8 W) r: X- Nlittle toy soldiers move around by my command, and that’s fun. She’s like, hmm. And she was the: q J% w' R( q. @4 ^ P
one who said, no, we’ll just approach it all as a storytelling activity. And she’s done wonderful work
/ [, s# b5 ?( hshowing that, particularly with middle school girls, if you present it as a storytelling activity, they’re) j5 z- `# X3 B+ ?4 ]: d# ^5 W
P a u s c h P a g e | 193 c+ Z9 Q8 A+ r n% n
perfectly willing to learn how to write computer software. So all-time best head fake award goes to2 S1 `$ g( y2 D) i8 p" c4 q. s
Caitlin Kelleher’s dissertation.
+ O+ U1 T1 B) W% h/ F; w4 cPresident Cohen, when I told him I was going to do this talk, he said, please tell them about having( X6 k! c. \1 V5 d
fun, because that’s what I remember you for. And I said, I can do that, but it’s kind of like a fish
! N! Y0 x* s( f* k* |' Ntalking about the importance of water. I mean I don’t know how to not have fun. I’m dying and I’m
" y; ?! b* ~9 x! N; r+ Uhaving fun. And I’m going to keep having fun every day I have left. Because there’s no other way to
* v* K. M* V: p8 T6 { V, o( Gplay it.
; _. H4 r% J2 f; b3 F& nSo my next piece of advice is, you just have to decide if you’re a Tigger or and Eeyore. [shows slide/ {% x& A( A" d) t4 P
with an image of Tigger and Eeyore with the phrase “Decide if you’re Tigger or Eeyore”] I think I’m
6 w! C- d; J# bclear where I stand on the great Tigger/Eeyore debate. [laughter] Never lose the childlike wonder.
( X: B& W& y2 nIt’s just too important. It’s what drives us. Help others. Denny Proffitt knows more about helping
: q' F4 O0 d3 P% }+ Eother people. He’s forgotten more than I’ll ever know. He’s taught me by example how to run a
# Y) F3 ~ ?7 y0 |6 Ggroup, how to care about people. M.K. Haley – I have a theory that people who come from large
M F& J k6 R- L2 Gfamilies are better people because they’ve just had to learn to get along. M.K. Haley comes from a) P1 d ?3 z4 I' V
family with 20 kids. [audience collectively “aaahs”] Yeah. Unbelievable. And she always says it’s# V4 l7 `; a) |. ?. [- ^/ t$ m3 w
kind of fun to do the impossible. When I first got to Imagineering, she was one of the people who$ R* c' a$ b& [ P4 }2 S
dressed me down, and she said, I understand you’ve joined the Aladdin Project. What can you do?( w6 y" u' [3 g" @ F7 @: T
And I said, well I’m a tenured professor of computer science. And she said, well that’s very nice
9 r2 Q7 w& |, X$ pProfessor Boy, but that’s not what I asked. I said what can you do? [laughter]
m3 [: k& i) L1 d3 i- bAnd you know I mentioned sort of my working class roots. We keep what is valuable to us, what we
3 k' U& d, ^: S$ |/ @cherish. And I’ve kept my [high school] letterman’s jacket all these years. [Puts on letterman’s
7 ^& h; ~- M7 w7 C, c3 Gjacket] I used to like wearing it in grad school, and one of my friends, Jessica Hodgins would say, why
$ y) o; }2 O6 Zdo you wear this letterman’s jacket? And I looked around at all the non-athletic guys around me+ u8 D0 ]5 ?' g
who were much smarter than me. And I said, because I can. [laughter] And so she thought that was
7 J& y% P& E8 L1 _# U% T Ba real hoot so one year she made for me this little Raggedy Randy doll. [takes out Raggedy Randy]. q) }& f& {- [* o$ ]
[laughter] He’s got a little letterman’s jacket too. That’s my all-time favorite. It’s the perfect gift for
/ u4 K b4 }* j/ }the egomaniac in your life. So, I’ve met so many wonderful people along the way./ f/ F( e. k& t; p
Loyalty is a two way street. There was a young man named Dennis Cosgrove at the University of9 c4 ~4 R, `5 Z- n4 X2 A
Virginia, and when he was a young man, let’s just say things happened. And I found myself talking M4 I4 C' J2 \2 o$ g% E
to a dean. No, not that dean. And anyway, this dean really had it in for Dennis, and I could never
- @6 C8 m8 j) a+ L3 {2 nfigure out why because Dennis was a fine fellow. But for some reason this Dean really had it in for
6 V" ~6 }0 X3 w: ?him. And I ended up basically saying, no, I vouch for Dennis. And the guy says, you’re not even
- I0 M& D5 v5 k5 e3 Ntenured yet and you’re telling me you’re going to vouch for this sophomore or junior or whatever? I9 q6 o( Q: ~5 f( E8 m m
think he was a junior at the time. I said, yeah, I’m going to vouch for him because I believe in him.7 y1 \% l0 o4 W: F
And the dean said, and I’m going to remember this when your tenure case comes up. And I said,1 a. o7 R7 ~# C9 a( F: S, v
deal. I went back to talk to Dennis and I said, I would really appreciate you… that would be good.1 S' B8 @2 ^$ I7 E
But loyalty is a two-way street. That was god knows how many years ago, but that’s the same: H3 B8 `! h# ~ a, ?+ \% j; ], @
Dennis Cosgrove who’s carrying Alice forward. He’s been with me all these years. And if we only
* Q# Y! _' k' U" I& hhad one person to send in a space probe to meet an alien species, I’m picking Dennis. [laughter] You) o2 R- R I7 ]8 O, [6 Y# s
can’t give a talk at Carnegie Mellon without acknowledging one very special person. And that would
* `' @0 }5 z. g, R8 `) d% J2 wbe Sharon Burks. I joked with her, I said, well look, if you’re retiring, it’s just not worth living4 J% U' z0 w. C( }8 E
anymore. Sharon is so wonderful it’s beyond description, and for all of us who have been helped by$ j' o( {& L3 w" H& l; N( \4 x
her, it’s just indescribable. I love this picture because it puts here together with Syl, and Syl is great
* C5 \. @+ R+ q- V) T: gbecause Syl gave the best piece of advice pound-for-pound that I have ever heard. And I think all
, D0 ]) H! N+ S. J2 P. qyoung ladies should hear this. Syl said, it took me a long time but I’ve finally figured it out. When it6 k4 H$ n1 g3 i9 p* X9 x! `
comes to men that are romantically interested in you, it’s really simple. Just ignore everything they
- q0 |4 n' A m, U5 I$ ]4 vsay and only pay attention to what they do. It’s that simple. It’s that easy. And I thought back to( z x4 H7 i% m* I) a5 c9 n
my bachelor days and I said, damn. [laughter]( }- {& a( B3 F
Never give up. I didn’t get into Brown University. I was on the wait list. I called them up and they. E4 J8 \6 ^ ?8 J1 A
eventually decided that it was getting really annoying to have me call everyday so they let me in. At
5 w' A; ?% n! w5 QCarnegie Mellon I didn’t get into graduate school. Andy had mentored me. He said, go to graduate
8 `$ l v: \/ y. Jschool, you’re going to Carnegie Mellon. All my good students go to Carnegie Mellon. Yeah, you3 @; g1 ]9 R7 _: C" j
know what’s coming. And so he said, you’re going to go to Carnegie Mellon no problem. What he
7 P. T9 ]4 Y# d& }! ^2 _+ ~/ {had kind of forgotten was that the difficulty of getting to the top Ph.D. program in the country had
- A3 P, k3 @0 Y% f2 c8 B Treally gone up. And he also didn’t know I was going to tank my GRE’s because he believed in me.6 Z3 ^. @' i3 Q9 c
Which, based on my board scores was a really stupid idea. And so I didn’t get into Carnegie Mellon.
1 B' g* D& U. F4 VNo one knows this. ‘Til today I’m telling the story. I was declined admission to Carnegie Mellon.. m1 G# J% S2 `/ Y2 A) P
And I was a bit of an obnoxious little kid. I went into Andy’s office and I dropped the rejection letter8 F# P: } N1 R) g' a; w3 L. |
on his desk. And I said, I just want you to know what your letter of recommendation goes for at
9 `0 C' ]4 E. d2 g0 }5 X! d, [Carnegie Mellon. [laughter] And before the letter had hit his desk, his hand was on the phone and
8 c' l" M2 J% g( Phe said, I will fix this. [laughter] And I said, no no no, I don’t want to do it that way. That’s not the
- H X. v' g) o9 h5 f: n/ T) b4 K1 ~way I was raised. [In a sad voice] Maybe some other graduate schools will see fit to admit me.. ^: Z' Q* S* q8 h# ^. V# `
[laughter] And he said, look, Carnegie Mellon’s where you’re going to be. He said, I’ll tell you what,8 Q, I4 q# f& O: G) _* H
I’ll make you a deal. Go visit the other schools. Because I did get into all the other schools. He said,. N c/ ?% O( o9 R$ @6 R
go visit the other schools and if you really don’t feel comfortable at any of them, then will you let me
. I9 g- u; _9 Ycall Nico? Nico being Nico Habermann [the head of Carnegie Mellon’s Computer Science Dept.] and7 T5 l- h7 F* n0 E8 R: f' u
I said, OK deal. I went to the other schools. Without naming them by name -- [in a coughing voice]! A r* r- z& P, T) a
Berkeley, Cornell. They managed to be so unwelcoming that I found myself saying to Andy, you
3 @. D: k6 y4 k0 ?* D: F1 L: Hknow, I’m going to get a job. And he said, no, you’re not. And he picked up the phone and he talked+ _9 N4 E" `- D+ R' m, N8 G
in Dutch. [laughter] And he hung up the phone and he said, Nico says if you’re serious, be in his
. u, y# X7 z( P1 F/ ~office tomorrow morning at eight a.m. And for those of you who know Nico, this is really scary. So
) g7 t- `& @: E* l q( q3 OI’m in Nico Habermann’s office the next morning at eight a.m. and he’s talking with me, and frankly I
9 k" ]0 N9 i7 n& ~$ Odon’t think he’s that keen on this meeting. I don’t think he’s that keen at all. And he says, Randy,
: M/ u0 m/ p( r9 q- f+ @! owhy are we here? And I said, because Andy phoned you? Heh-heh. [laughter] And I said, well, since4 ?0 q( r: m( j6 w
you admitted me, I have won a fellowship. The Office of Naval Research is a very prestigious! N0 u" q' L6 c$ k' h- {2 b6 M
fellowship. I’ve won this fellowship and that wasn’t in my file when I applied. And Nico said, a
4 d9 G/ U5 j/ J5 f" |fellowship, money, we have plenty of money. That was back then. He said, we have plenty of
+ y: N7 w) e$ r! n$ L7 emoney. Why do you think having a fellowship makes any difference to us? And he looked at me.8 g/ \' u- O, d5 x- ~
There are moments that change your life. And ten years later if you know in retrospect it was one of/ V1 @* a( W5 q7 O- j
those moments, you’re blessed. But to know it at the moment …. with Nico staring through your
/ y) Y% U: C1 U; S! \& IP a u s c h P a g e | 212 Q! c/ s* L. l, a
soul. [laughter] And I said, I didn’t mean to imply anything about the money. It’s just that it was an) E+ s, u7 B& ~" q5 ~+ u% ]
honor. There were only 15 given nationwide. And I did think it was an honor that would be
5 y8 [ s. A0 L, W" |: j+ D, Z: Nsomething that would be meritorious. And I apologize if that was presumptuous. And he smiled.! v1 {; N% A5 o1 I- y
And that was good.
- V9 _8 P( d3 ~$ }8 {! C! QSo. How do you get people to help you? You can’t get there alone. People have to help you and I
# Z! m2 t7 L7 s( [ T: w( I1 h5 g7 Jdo believe in karma. I believe in paybacks. You get people to help you by telling the truth. Being$ N$ p1 l4 u* }1 {* T& J
earnest. I’ll take an earnest person over a hip person every day, because hip is short term. Earnest
; S5 t% A& I0 [3 A7 xis long term.
b1 G& _. Z* X/ p# d0 P8 KApologize when you screw up and focus on other people, not on yourself. And I thought, how do I% }6 m. l5 V7 E/ c7 h+ m& U3 {, {
possibly make a concrete example of that? [Speaking to stage hand] Do we have a concrete
& Q% a' [" j% Y% _6 H! u iexample of focusing on somebody else over there? Could we bring it out? [Speaking to audience]
+ V* q4 O- D: v# Q& C& qSee, yesterday was my wife’s birthday. If there was ever a time I might be entitled to have the focus
8 K, T7 S* x4 R/ h( O1 ]* Non me, it might be the last lecture. But no, I feel very badly that my wife didn’t really get a proper& g# F p) \6 r7 p
birthday, and I thought it would be very nice if 500 people— [an oversized birthday cake is wheeled
2 R/ B9 J6 S8 p4 ^' v9 xonto the stage] [applause] Happy—
7 B, l+ q( C* V+ c5 j' iEveryone:2 q' _* u7 j1 C1 ~( {
…birthday to you [Randy: her name is Jai], happy birthday to you. Happy birthday dear Jai, happy
; Q# i6 l- j7 C( n3 C; @birthday to you! [applause]
4 Q( h2 z( C' i$ R[Jai walks on stage, teary-eyed. She walks with Randy to the cake. Randy: You gotta blow it out. The# r) N8 b8 D1 I1 u
audience goes quiet. Jai blows out the candle on the cake. Randy: All right. Massive applause.]0 ~; n, a$ |+ `! V" I6 u7 h
Randy Pausch:) v$ H# Y- s/ t' G
And now you all have an extra reason to come to the reception. [laughter] Remember brick walls let
1 G! k5 |: G$ _) |/ Zus show our dedication. They are there to separate us from the people who don’t really want to
* N5 E7 P& a( F8 c2 machieve their childhood dreams. Don’t bail. The best of the gold’s at the bottom of barrels of crap.7 e* m; @, S. J# l
[Shows slide of Steve Seabolt next to a picture of The Sims] [laughter] What Steve didn’t tell you was. }$ v4 R7 }% G+ J( h
the big sabbatical at EA, I had been there for 48 hours and they loved the ETC, we were the best, we
5 k9 I* i! V a ~were the favorites, and then somebody pulled me aside and said, oh, by the way, we’re about to4 f" ~* Z4 y8 F) Q1 E( c+ |
give eight million dollars to USC to build a program just like yours. We’re hoping you can help them
2 K0 K: t/ f6 Q. V0 h$ oget it off the ground. [laughter] And then Steve came along and said, they said what? Oh god. And% d: R# [2 B# V7 n1 |
to quote a famous man, I will fix this. And he did. Steve has been an incredible partner. And we- ^: P7 g5 t) p7 c( [ S6 A& Y2 p
have a great relationship, personal and professional. And he has certainly been point man on7 F/ }8 c+ T8 p. G4 @' U$ a; F
getting a gaming asset to help teach millions of kids and that’s just incredible. But, you know, it
, {& D- f1 A' k% {certainly would have been reasonable for me to leave 48 hours after that sabbatical, but it wouldn’t
( s: `$ @7 q8 c. K4 m) C8 |have been the right thing to do, and when you do the right thing, good stuff has a way of happening.
$ \/ K% e* E+ F* b. U0 ~- ]Get a feedback loop and listen to it. Your feedback loop can be this dorky spreadsheet thing I did, or8 O T/ B- \3 Q+ k
it can just be one great man who tells you what you need to hear. The hard part is the listening to it.
- L% K5 |) G% l1 I% E$ u. t0 uP a u s c h P a g e | 22$ @$ ]: S7 P1 ~5 R2 c. h5 u1 Q
Anybody can get chewed out. It’s the rare person who says, oh my god, you were right. As opposed
% [! i! a1 `. t$ i& a& r* Hto, no wait, the real reason is… We’ve all heard that. When people give you feedback, cherish it and: S3 Q. U) C7 L, U0 K2 o! G" ^
use it.# [. [4 |# ]7 i( _
Show gratitude. When I got tenure I took all of my research team down to Disneyworld for a week.& V& Q" s9 |. }) Z/ l" l
And one of the other professors at Virginia said, how can you do that? I said these people just' U8 Y" j/ c) ^
busted their ass and got me the best job in the world for life. How could I not do that? W; D i% Y& ^/ @
Don’t complain. Just work harder. [shows slide of Jackie Robinson, the first black major league0 J1 x* _4 A9 c5 o5 Q' v _/ f
baseball player] That’s a picture of Jackie Robinson. It was in his contract not to complain, even1 U d- Q2 k4 |' L% h3 V) K: p
when the fans spit on him.
& L1 G/ z2 r$ z4 |( JBe good at something, it makes you valuable.
2 b; A3 |. s0 i7 a+ ~! KWork hard. I got tenure a year early as Steve mentioned. Junior faculty members used to say to me,- l$ a7 F) N2 j4 U+ S. S
wow, you got tenure early. What’s your secret? I said, it’s pretty simple. Call my any Friday night in
8 J; h* G4 D8 a4 F) Bmy office at ten o’clock and I’ll tell you." Z. ~, v$ q' D2 _
Find the best in everybody. One of the things that Jon Snoddy as I said told me, is that you might
7 v' A$ K5 U- o( f3 S) r# rhave to wait a long time, sometimes years, but people will show you their good side. Just keep2 s! T7 e G0 `2 p& v" S: O+ ^
waiting no matter how long it takes. No one is all evil. Everybody has a good side, just keep waiting,. n- d+ y1 ~* A/ T3 C! V
it will come out.
2 o& U! h0 c% X) b( V$ Z+ A0 }$ [3 M! TAnd be prepared. Luck is truly where preparation meets opportunity.
- f- w3 [& g* dSo today’s talk was about my childhood dreams, enabling the dreams of others, and some lessons. E" J' m( y3 m
learned. But did you figure out the head fake? [dramatic pause] It’s not about how to achieve your( ]- p! z8 G; f U
dreams. It’s about how to lead your life. If you lead your life the right way, the karma will take care7 a6 N4 [* W" ^
of itself. The dreams will come to you.3 k7 |6 }) Y8 H
Have you figured out the second head fake? The talk’s not for you, it’s for my kids. Thank you all,4 ]. @) `3 C- Y1 L3 V+ F& N$ r
good night.
( Y7 r% h/ w; }* a% l+ h* U[applause; standing ovation for 90 seconds; Randy brings Jai onto the stage and they take a bow; they sit
8 E$ w7 G; X# f S7 O" h4 Ldown in their seats; standing ovation continues for another minute]0 @0 F; C* G+ _3 Y9 V
Randy Bryant:
, I2 _$ c/ V5 s4 U4 {! VThank you everyone. I’d like to thank all of you for coming. This really means a lot I know to Randy.
8 Q0 Q( B. |- X N) f* d: dHe had this theory even up to yesterday that there wouldn’t be anyone in the room.% V( @7 K. p: [$ E$ s& l& v
Randy Pausch [from seat]:0 `) \3 o+ ]0 e) J5 u% F( T7 f5 d7 C
After CS50…! j: H g% j3 S7 V0 `
Randy Bryant:: m6 h' a: y$ W$ N8 P9 l, I
I know. I’m the other Randy. That’s been my role here for the past 10 years ever since Randy
! K- E2 Q2 {+ uPausch came here on the faculty. And what I mean by that is, I introduce myself. I’m Randy Bryant
9 V+ X/ Y( [" \4 |: q8 B; m# yfrom Computer Science. They go, oh, Randy from CS. You’re the one that does all that cool stuff of5 Y# T% I; l2 ^ K1 t
building virtual worlds and teaching children how to program. And I go, no, no, sorry. That’s the5 }+ P, z4 O4 m3 Z
other Randy. I’m the wrong one. Sorry, I’m just like a dull nerd. [laughter] So, but I’m very pleased, f- O, p6 U) `4 \$ h1 x# n0 v; @
today to be able to sort of run a brief series of ways in which we want to recognize Randy for his
/ M6 C/ G3 L8 T" ?contributions he’s made to Carnegie Mellon, to computer science and to the world at large. So we
1 C' e# f0 f% z( K4 N( Nhave a few – it will be a brief program. We have a few people I’ll be bringing up one after the other.
* C3 H% K4 g* e4 T) Q }I’m sort of the MC here. So first I’d like to introduce who you’ve already met, Steve Seabolt from* l7 Y# S7 {: ?0 \- q c# ~
Electronic Arts. [applause]
/ S' h; v: x8 @' E* |1 R0 sSteve Seabolt:
F7 ~5 V4 w. U R* I1 a, D) CMy family wondered whether or not I would make it through the introduction. [voice starts to crack
! b! g) c" @& \$ tup] And I did that but I might not do so well now. So bear with me. As Randy mentioned, he and I, w, b+ P2 }/ {0 n* k( \: ^/ k% n
Carnegie Mellon and Electronic Arts share a particular passion about nurturing young girls and trying# c$ q5 k3 L; I, M
to encourage young girls to stay with math and stay with science. Every geek in the world shouldn’t1 e+ D8 j5 Y4 M2 o/ U
be a guy. You know, it’s such a twist of fate that there’s so many people that are worried about offshoring,
' C+ a1 ] f7 V1 {/ oand at the same time companies are forced to off-shore, there are fewer and fewer; `' y* c; F# g# U3 e/ g
students entering computer science. And the number of women entering computer science just. X( f% I: A8 e% k. k
keeps dropping like a rock. There are way too few Caitlins in this world. And Caitlin, we need so; L9 w5 k: q/ I
many more of you. And with that in mind, Electronic Arts has endowed a scholarship fund. It’s the0 l! p" s/ X( e8 O) s' v
Randy Pausch endowed scholarship fund, established in 2007 by EA. In honor of Randy’s leadership5 P, O; }/ M& {" L
and contribution to education, computer science, digital entertainment, and his commitment to, \/ m& u1 ~. f5 U' w5 e
women in technology. This scholarship will be awarded annually to a female undergraduate CMU
- r# {) ]0 z# y* A/ B# i; nstudent who demonstrates excellence in computer science and a passion in the pursuit of a career in) U: p, ], F) F, H3 j5 B M
video games. Randy, we’re so honored to do this in your name. [applause]8 y0 a1 m- s+ P. Q8 `) b$ O
Randy Bryant:! U# z: T/ y* Y7 R1 n
Next I’d like to introduce Jim Foley. He’s on the faculty at Georgia Tech and he’s here representing: K* z9 Z/ o9 o" a
the ACM Special Interest Group in Computer Human Interaction. Jim. [applause]
; ^! d1 S4 H8 IJim Foley:" I( v; f6 b1 s2 T( S7 i" W
[motions to Randy Pausch to come on stage; gives him a hug] That was for Jim. [applause] ACM, the
4 f1 H3 H5 P, s4 n4 M( }- MAssociation for Computing Machinery is a group of about 100,000 computing professionals. One of
- L, [0 D% v+ U$ ~; o* z% Q8 k2 {their special areas of interest is computer human interaction. A few weeks ago, someone who’s a! w- |0 B i" i& u
very good friend of Randy’s wrote a citation which was endorsed by a number of people and went to
4 f; c- H9 B1 z/ z2 _) [0 h6 W7 A9 ~the executive committee of SIGCHI, which on behalf of the SIGCHI membership, has authorized this
+ g" X6 }4 @7 w0 Hspecial presentation. The citation was written by Ben Schneiderman and worked on then by Jenny( F4 A! ~4 ^8 a1 [$ o9 |
Preese and Ben Peterson, and endorsed by a whole bunch of your friends and now from the
& ^+ g! b( N* Y4 u0 Vexecutive committee. So let me read to you the citation. Special award for professional% a! |' W! k$ e
contributions. Randy Pausch’s innovative work has spanned several disciplines and has inspired both
9 [' E6 M9 ^2 [1 s( f8 Y$ R! |mature researchers and a generation of students. His deep technical competence, choice of
* f g1 v) p: q6 t" D9 C6 ?imaginative projects and visionary thinking are always combined with energy and passion. We’ve: A' o% u" b+ Q9 \- ~/ u7 F
seen that. From his early work on the simple user interface toolkit to his current work on 3D Alice
0 a2 @9 D! D% P" G5 o. {5 e* o% Eprogramming language, he has shown that innovative tool design enables broad participation in
' _3 q. A" ~! p' ~1 h5 M: vprogramming, especially by women and minorities. Randy Pausch has vigorous commitment to
1 i& d R2 E' q5 t1 g5 z0 Nengaging students at every level by compelling and intellectually rigorous projects, and his appealing
; u+ K7 j& [+ U0 Blecture style for a role-model for every teacher and lecture. Yes, yes yes. [voice starts to crack up]; h0 ?+ i1 F: ?- z7 \
His work has helped make team project experiences and educational computing research more9 S6 v4 h$ _$ I6 L5 B9 k4 H
common and respected. As a National Science Foundation Presidential Young Investigator, a Lilly
/ G2 W, x0 T5 X# ~Teaching Foundation Teaching Fellow, co-founder of the CMU ET Center and consultant for Disney+ d8 n0 S: g4 }0 A
Imagineering and EA, Randy’s done pioneering work in combining computing interface design and$ H# l* q8 g. N$ N
emotionally rich experiences. For these and many other contributions, the ACM SIGCHI executive5 \5 H' f2 g0 G$ Q' D, R3 Q
council is proud to present to Randy Pausch a special award for professional contributions.
! D. ^' o# H o( E/ j- A( F[applause] [Randy comes back on stage to receive award]
( k9 M( r8 |2 |# t3 YRandy Bryant:( U$ v7 ~# r$ W6 i1 n5 m& z/ M
Thank you, Jim. Next I’d like to introduce Jerry Cohen, the President of Carnegie Mellon University.
R; ?/ V; b+ ^* X/ O[applause] m. ~4 P! d5 @
Jerry Cohen:3 T' |. P2 h# X$ c* ^
Thank you other Randy. [Tries to move Randy Pausch’s bag of props to the side of the podium] You# T4 t6 V+ s' s! H: }0 X$ P: W
know you’re traveling heavy, buddy. Many of us have been thinking about and talking about how
3 E6 q; b! l; I9 Y0 [we can recognize you on this campus in a way that is lasting and fitting in terms of what you meant+ \6 w- B, F. a; c9 b* b7 C
to this university. A lot of people are involved in this. You thought the provost wasn’t paying+ p' i' i' h% i2 s
attention all those years. [laughter] Actually, one of the ways we’re going to remember you is this. r. U3 O, `& W3 i7 r: ?; C$ X
$50,000 bill for stuffed animals. $47,862.32 for pizza. You’ve made great contributions, Randy, we: [/ c9 u+ z+ V w7 C2 K
really appreciate it. [laughter] One thing we could not do, regrettably, is figure out a way to capture7 g% P8 T! \- R( n- e
the kind of person that you are. You’re humanity, what you’ve meant to us as a colleague, as a
0 o, E! G2 I2 ^/ ]% P3 cteacher. As a student. And as a friend. There’s just no way to capture that. There is our memories,4 T# g' Z9 `1 b8 }# J( u6 ]
however. And there is a way to remember you every day, as people walk this campus. So we’ve
- d |" i$ F0 b% B& u4 acome up with an idea. You’ve done great things for this campus and for computer science and for1 A* z7 Z5 ~' ` F# j& m
the world. Surely Alice will live on. But the one we’re going to focus on right now is what you’ve+ T; ?3 y$ Z$ l: m! H( W* B1 v o
done to connect computer science with the arts. It was remarkable, it was stunning. It’s had
) v( V7 h8 V8 ~6 D% s3 |" venormous impact, and it will last, I daresay forever. So to recognize that, we are going to do the
0 G1 ]. t2 q8 u& c; Cfollowing. Good job, other Randy. [laughter, as Randy Bryant gets the projector to show the next
9 Z$ {4 t( l! i R4 P, c9 H4 Rslide] In order to effect this, we had to build a building. [Shows slide of mockup of Gates building] A- R! d) m& S. `* h# K2 m5 x
hundred million dollar building which will allow us to do the following. You’ll note, by the way, to4 o! {$ Z3 G7 S2 h4 i
orient people. So the Purnell Center for the Arts is the home of the School of Drama. That modern0 i2 _9 }1 K( _1 f4 e6 `0 k! j- ?
looking new thing, half of which has a green roof, is the new Gates Center for Computer Science.
5 u" X/ A0 o. G, [, G/ t+ R2 eAnd we had long planned to connect these two physically, both to allow people to get down from: g- l) `$ t/ T
the cut to lower campus, and you have to admit it carries tremendous symbolic importance. Well
9 F& ^' X: L2 Y* I6 l, y) ron behalf of the Board of Trustees of Carnegie Mellon and on behalf of the entire university, I’m
# u J1 H7 a2 {/ n ? p Q! qpleased to announce today that the bridge connecting these two will be known as the Randy Pausch
' Z! |- y4 X( H4 Z5 l, L/ X; B5 |Memorial Footbridge. [shows slide of mockup of bridge] [applause] Now actually based on your talk6 M* g0 }9 f9 a1 P+ a2 `
today we’re thinking now about putting up a brick wall up at either end, and let students see what
; f9 i$ |# V8 X1 ]they can do with it. [laughter] Randy, there’ll be a generation of students and faculty to come here
) y( c4 j# w* x+ O9 O3 ]: l" `who will not know you, but they will cross that bridge, they will see your name, and they’ll ask those
/ z8 ~' A+ _5 c$ u pof us who did know you. And we will tell them that unfortunately they were not able to experience+ w) r5 y! f: Q" Z- j# ~
the man, but they are surely experiencing the impact of the man. Randy, thank you for all that
, V1 D( d* A9 h/ Y6 qyou’ve done for Carnegie Mellon. We’re going to miss you. [applause] [Randy walks on stage and
1 u$ f# F# b6 [- {! `gives Jerry a hug]
1 d3 s4 n3 f! R r, O, ?. QRandy Bryant:$ }2 \/ z( S }/ F5 z
So every good show needs a closing act, and so to do that I’ll invite Andy Van Dam. [applause]5 F4 q) H. b4 ~) v4 n' R% ~5 M
Andy Van Dam:0 m l7 p! k! h* x/ ?- p3 ~
Oh how I love having the last word. [applause] But to have to go on after that fabulous show, I don’t0 c6 b+ w+ w0 o5 E$ ?
know whether that was good planning. Well I started in Brown in 1965 and it has been my pleasure
" [6 C7 D) s- N2 A7 K" Xand great joy not just to teach thousands of undergraduates and some graduates, but also to work
* d0 g& ]0 g! F0 L% ]* O: pone-on-one with a couple hundred of them. And over 35 have followed me into teaching I’m proud6 Z. g( H. n) R# X
to say. Out of those best and brightest it was very clear that Randy would stand out. He showed( J3 E9 p' m( f+ e6 R* t) c
great promise early on and a passion about our field and about helping others that you’ve seen
2 M! ^- A; T+ @amply demonstrated today. It was matched by fierce determination and by persistence in the face
7 J3 [ p2 _3 U$ }0 Z5 O: I) Pof all brick wall odds. And you’ve heard a lot about that and seen that demonstrated as he fights
. p9 ] u6 {6 Y9 Y0 k3 {& `2 H8 mthis terrible disease. Like the elephant’s child, however, he was filled with satiable curiosity, you3 G W3 q0 Z" p1 z; r* x
remember that. And what happened to the elephant’s child, he got spanked by all of his relations,
1 G, D, P" V) Y6 m" U1 zand you’ve heard some of that. He was brash, he had an irrepressible, raucous sense of humor,- @" B' u, }% d6 |; t8 f; @+ G1 [
which led to the fantastic showmanship that you saw today. He was self-assured, occasionally to
$ s- x" `+ y' z$ Wthe point of outright cockiness. And stubborn as a mule. And I’m a Dutchman and I know from
3 {1 g8 L2 b! l; q3 v6 \. }stubbornness. The kind way to say it is he had an exceedingly strong inner compass, and you’ve9 \; Q$ @0 x5 `, ~4 F7 Q# K& p
seen that demonstrated over and over again. Now, having been accused of many such traits myself,
) Z! K% Q) [" J( W! h& vI rather thought of them as features, not bugs. [laughter] Having had to learn English the hard way, I! Q& W7 F3 l0 S3 n3 v0 P
was a fanatic about getting students to speak and write correct English from the get-go. And Randy/ E/ h; k$ {* }" \1 S
the mouth had no problem with that. But he did have one problem. And I’m having a problem with
7 V% e$ R& E7 |3 }' r/ N" Zmy machine here, here we go. [gets slide to project on screen]. And that was another part of my( B) p0 C* S9 ]5 @& k
fanaticism which dealt with having American students learn about foreign cultures. And specifically" i" t7 c2 e7 n( C
about food cultures, and more specifically yet, about Chinese food culture. So I would take my
- B# |+ m% H" o# S. e4 |+ H |: gstudents to this wonderful Chinese restaurant where they cooked off the menu using a Chinese
7 `6 b0 {5 j& c8 I0 {& _, Hmenu. And I tried to get Randy to sample this. But would Mr. White Bread touch that stuff?
2 d2 [- _' `2 c[laughter] Absolutely not. And worse, he refused to learn to eat with chopsticks. I was chairman at
8 G; r1 `% h, Q" A2 Uthe time and I said, Randy, you know, I’m not going to let you graduate if you don’t learn to eat with
8 t9 S8 A4 Y/ B, h1 _chopsticks! [laughter] It’s a requirement, didn’t you see that? He of course didn’t believe that. And8 [2 U3 m' z0 n2 Y8 D$ ?' x
so it came time for graduation and I handed him his diploma. And this was the picture one of my1 _, M' X3 V& w4 y2 e2 p
friends took. [Shows slide of Brown University commencement, 1982, Randy dressed in his cap and, A2 {! j. R, }* d8 V# ~
gown, opening his diploma, his mouth wide open in surprise] And what you see is Randy opening his
* O6 X8 L5 X. gdiploma to show it to his parents, and there was an autographed copy of the menu in Chinese and
3 c9 G! ` y+ xno diploma. [laughter, applause] It was one of the few times I got the better of him, I have to
; t3 k r- { L/ y2 ?confess. Well here we are today, all of us, and hundreds and hundreds of people all over the
# Y" ^# U: ^6 ycountry, I dare say all over the world, participating in this great event to celebrate you and your life.
" a5 t* v' _& | ]1 pRandy is the person, the Mensch, as we say in Yiddish. Your manifold accomplishments as a model
/ J/ R+ G$ @6 `) k) ?' kacademic, especially as a mentor to your students. Your Disneyland expeditions not only were$ f0 z) `' S: V) N1 a; |/ n0 M
unique but they are legendary. You have more than fulfilled the terms of Brown University Charter,
8 q, R: W# H4 R. f# v( M1 cwhich are: to discharge the offices of life with usefulness and reputation. Your utter devotion to
1 ~, O* n7 r9 n, Q$ R4 Ayour family and your career are exemplary, and continue unabated as you cope with the immensity
$ k8 v3 A' ^0 O4 ]# `- i& ~1 @& ^+ Eof your situation. You exemplify undaunted courage and grace under pressure. The most terrible8 m5 u4 x) J" W8 b
pressure one can imagine. Randy, you have been and you will continue to be a role model for us.8 W7 y' T4 k# k0 o
[Voice starts cracking up] Thank you so much for all you have done for us. And to allow us to tell: O! V0 q0 Q% Q0 u; S( d. S3 z
you privately and in such a public way how much we admire, honor, and indeed love you. [applause]# n# G" H4 I9 ^5 q" \2 P+ v# |
[standing ovation]- Z' P$ \1 B8 C1 i9 H" J0 g9 W
* s$ P" y6 `$ I2 Y& p: V[ 本帖最后由 billzhao 于 2008-11-16 18:02 编辑 ] |
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