Over at Salon.com, David Brin's been speculating on the demise of the BASIC programming language and what it means for the next generation of programmers. In "Why Johnny Can't Code", he argues that BASIC -- once a standard part of every PC -- allowed would-be coders to understand programming in a fundamental, transparent way that today's languages just can't do.

He raises some good points. This is something I've been thinking about with my own kids -- my mom started teaching me to program on an Apple II+ when I was in second grade. What would be the modern equivelent of that trusty family computer of lore? Will Jordan's first program be an AppleScript? Some snippet of variant C used to drive a LEGO robot? Or will something new have arisen to fill this niche?