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Randy Pausch’s Last Lecture: Really Achieving Your Childhood Dreams 视频+原稿

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Randy Pausch’s Last Lecture: Really Achieving Your Childhood Dreams
  e- z5 b7 z3 B/ [, r* v' MGiven at Carnegie Mellon University
9 S0 g4 x$ r0 D- |$ a8 i4 aTuesday, September 18, 2007% H: X+ T4 c& @
McConomy Auditorium
: R0 O6 I1 u; `2 F' H. WFor more information, see www.randypausch.com# }% l  X4 K; {1 ]+ \& ~4 V
© Copyright Randy Pausch, 20071- f- N4 R1 G- v- d+ q% C

& c2 S" l, h: F/ K( ~4 vIntroduction by Indira Nair, Carnegie Mellon’s Vice Provost for Education:
5 `+ B( L, b- T6 VHi. Welcome. It’s my pleasure to introduce you to the first of our new university’s lectures titled/ }! r% h6 D9 ]' `2 a0 Z
Journeys – lectures in which members of our community will share with us reflections and insights; v3 O  J0 h! W. ?9 C
on their personal and professional journeys. Today’s Journey’s lecture as you all know is by4 h3 p. U0 N5 E/ Q9 V
Professor Randy Pausch. The next one is on Monday, September 24th by Professor Roberta Klatzky.6 |; y+ e) D2 p" d. H2 g3 B
To introduce Professor Randy Pausch, our first Journeys speaker, I would like to introduce Randy’s
: Q# L. v5 T- g8 c3 b6 ]2 Xfriend and colleague, Steve Seabolt. Steve has been at Electronic Arts for six years and is the Vice7 D. n& V+ Q: K' p
President of Global Brand Development for The Sims label at Electronic Arts. As you all know, The
6 F( r. B3 L) V9 FSims is one of the most, if not the most successful PC games in the world, with sales approaching
( S  j0 }1 m4 {* \6 _1 s3 [! Cover $100,000,000. Prior to that, Steve was the Vice President for Strategic Marketing and* t/ W, M% K2 Q" q+ j0 I/ [
Education at EA, bridging academia and Electronic Arts. His goal was to work with academics so
% u1 A; T5 V6 Tthere was an effective educational pathway for kids with building games as their dreams. It was in7 ]& p: H' ^! `) t% R: G
that role that Randy and Steve became colleagues and friends. Before Electronic Arts, Steve was the6 D; C4 E% A" U- a0 V1 {0 X( G1 V
worldwide Ad Director for Time Magazine and CEO of Sunset Publishing, which is a very favorite+ [" X7 F7 x% U8 _- @/ M& L
magazine in the Southwest, and as CEO there, one of the things he started was school tours,
9 ~7 X: h/ M9 @5 |. obecause like Randy he shares a passion for inspiring kids of all ages to share their excitement for& L' ~; B' h  a8 M1 M% {
science and technology.7 d( l; s( v: }0 M
So to introduce Randy, his friend Steve Seabolt. Steve?. H- }2 m6 Z! E; M' _5 U4 [# l
[applause]
' ?# D( {# j0 U& _: T# J. ~2 J# OSteve Seabolt, Vice President of Worldwide Publishing and Marketing for Electonic Arts (EA):
& R* j+ M, O3 x( z! ?- H8 ]& pThank you very much. I don’t mean to sound ungracious by correcting you, but given that our PR
7 V2 t- c4 G' n# ypeople are probably watching this on webcast, I’d catch heck if I went home and didn’t say that it2 O$ ]; W0 M3 s, G
was 100 million units for The Sims. [laughter] Not that big numbers matter to Electronic Arts.' S! f( \8 _) e9 v' d9 H
[laughter]+ U+ c2 k' {# b0 H- |# w
I don’t see any empty seats anywhere, which is a good thing, which means I just won a bet from. z/ I4 q  D* L" W% e- P9 H2 e5 o
Randy as a matter of fact. Depending upon who’s version of the story you hear, he either owes me; M% ~% n6 O7 U# E; ^
20 dollars or his new Volkswagen. [laughter] So, I’ll take the car.% j& l1 _0 v9 S  {# t
It’s a pleasure to be here, thank you very much. I’m going to start by covering Randy’s academic
3 j7 W( r* c7 wcredentials. It’s a little bizarre for me to be standing here at Carnegie Mellon, which is a school I  k1 d: s% e5 C- K  C' q" Z. a
couldn’t get into no matter how much I contributed to this institution. [laughter] But, no really, I’m
8 {3 P+ {' Q/ @+ Inot kidding! You all think, oh gosh he’s humble. Really, no, I’m not humble at all. Very average SAT
) c4 n& i# H" @" m6 fscores, you know, right in the middle of my high school class of 900. Anyway, Randy. Randy earned2 b1 D3 g+ V) k& l; P  H
– it really pisses me off that Randy’s so smart—actually I called him, we decided about, what, four7 J3 O# U* k$ D& v
weeks, ago and we heard the news went from bad to horrific. It was on a Wednesday night and I
& o, ^# b# a, ?. K8 P$ f" O$ Gsaid look – we have two choices. We can play this really straight and very emotional , or we can go6 _7 P& b" s. j0 z& v1 Q/ Q
to dark humor. And for those of you who know Randy well, he was like oh, dark humor! So I called
% W! k3 n6 m# Whim the next day and I was like, dude you can’t die. And he’s like, what do you mean? And I said,
4 \6 P4 H1 l+ M" C  y% Ywell, when you die, the average of IQ of Seabolt’s friends is going to like drop 50 points. [laughter] To3 p$ c1 L: E7 M
which he responded, we need to find you some smarter friends. [laughter] So you’re all smart1 g6 \) q# v5 S$ w( M* F, S
because you’re here, so if you want to be my friend, I’ll be over in a corner of the reception room.  i; m! k+ v. V. L1 g4 A8 `5 R
Randy earned his undergraduate degree in Computer Science at Brown in 1982. His Ph.D. in CS from
1 [" ^9 H% K- M. C5 ~) Y/ P7 ^Carnegie Mellon in 1988 and taught at the University of Virginia where he was granted tenure a year, s  j4 W6 C; H* B( A
early. He joined the Carnegie Mellon faculty in 1997 with appointments in the CS, HCI and Design
  J0 @; X$ O4 F) e4 n: B$ Ddepartments. He has authored or co-authored five books and over 60 reviewed journal and( ^1 l) q. I( h3 Q' E" m& \
conference proceeding articles, none of which I would understand. With Don Marinelli, he founded' A7 c1 X& B  _6 ]
the Entertainment Technology Center, which quickly became the gold standard organization for
( D' `/ L0 ?0 }, e, Dtraining artists and engineers to work together. It is my view and the view of our company,
- I& {, \' O  `9 |0 VElectronic Arts, that the ETC is the interactive program by which all others in the world are judged.3 L$ w6 t  r9 P6 f) Y( `+ ^+ b
I met Randy in the Spring of 2004, and when I look back it’s sort of hard to imagine it’s only been
% k5 N: v3 E! i5 `! C* l; othree years given the depth of our friendship. The ETC already had a very strong relationship with
0 Y8 A$ }4 |$ mEA and with Randy. And Randy as he always does, for those of you who know him well, wanted to
: L6 E" t: z3 u1 f" ^' J/ ?learn more, with his own eyes, about how the games business works, and how games really got+ t' S3 |3 g$ c- G# r) v$ l4 i
made. So he spent a summer in residence at EA, and I was his primary contact point. We were in
$ t- ~7 m  z, ?! l! U9 i3 P" `my view the odd couple. Randy the brilliant, charming, Carnegie educated CS professor. And me) d3 j5 s! f% i
who went to the University of Iowa on a wing and a prayer. We spent a lot of time together that
. U* B: P' ~+ K  ysemester and for those of you who know Randy well, that’s a lot of turkey sandwiches on white
0 ]' i5 T9 F0 o- h+ Ebread with mayo. [laughter, clapping] My kids tease me about being “white.” There’s nobody more7 {+ A1 _) c" ]3 c. s
“white” than Randy. [laughter] We spent an enormous amount of time together. We taught each5 k! q' Z, x+ _, t5 s8 ^; U
other about each other’s very interesting, strange cultures to the other. Academic versus the
( {% [3 N6 `+ n5 Y# Bcorporate world. And we developed a deep friendship woven together with stories about our kids,; ^! R# P  ~  ^2 u0 ~$ G" o! h
our wives, our parents, as well as deep discussions about the paramount nature of integrity in2 j7 x. M! Y- e4 e; @' x0 v  s
everything you do, family first, religion, our shared joy in connecting people and ideas, and
7 z: q% D8 d. }7 H5 s7 qdeploying money and influence to do good. And the importance of having a lot of laughs along the
  a! h7 S. k0 y, p: [  ~way.0 [7 T% h: ]' c' a, j# K
Randy’s dedication to making the world a better place is self evident to anyone who has crossed
! J6 y' o. Y, fpaths with him. Whether it’s directly influencing students, creating organizations like the ETC,4 S, O" T$ w: u6 O% M6 X6 l
building tools like Alice or doing what he probably does best, which is bridging cultures. As Ben/ H4 s( ^0 k& X9 o$ i
Gordon, EA’s Chief Creative Officer, says of Randy, even more important than Randy’s academic,4 K5 C" F0 t% D" f0 W
philanthropic, and entrepreneurial accomplishments has been his humanity and the enthusiasm he
, d8 x6 D2 P+ r) {; ?6 _) Cbrings to students and coworkers on a daily basis.+ {* e! Q: p# Q( M! K
For those of you who know Randy, Randy brings a particular zest for life and humor, even while
/ S* `$ g, _' K# z9 bfacing death. To Randy, this is simply another adventure. It is my great honor to introduce Dylan," q+ j4 C. h  c6 _+ |, F' d
Logan and Chloe’s dad, Jai’s husband, and my very dear friend, Dr. Randy Pausch. [applause]: F) t& U, Q5 r6 q) k, b+ x
Randy Pausch:: R- x9 C' t. T* n
[responding to a standing ovation] Make me earn it. [laughter]
" F8 k# J8 G+ T  XIt’s wonderful to be here. What Indira didn’t tell you is that this lecture series used to be called the6 Z4 {5 W" F  @  O6 ?' n! ?+ s
Last Lecture. If you had one last lecture to give before you died, what would it be? I thought, damn,9 u4 q0 |: R" `$ F7 i( ?
I finally nailed the venue and they renamed it. [laughter]- e: e1 x7 |3 I7 ?4 o
So, you know, in case there’s anybody who wandered in and doesn’t know the back story, my dad+ E( u# m  ~. X5 E' E6 _
always taught me that when there’s an elephant in the room, introduce them. If you look at my CAT
, K& Y8 S6 E: s) o5 ascans, there are approximately 10 tumors in my liver, and the doctors told me 3-6 months of good" M5 s3 I; u2 g
health left. That was a month ago, so you can do the math. I have some of the best doctors in the
, V6 m7 ?$ Q% l4 ?5 ]$ C  q% iworld. Microphone’s not working? Then I’ll just have to talk louder. [Adjusts mic] Is that good? All1 c! {! o" Y; a/ S& B
right. So that is what it is. We can’t change it, and we just have to decide how we’re going to
0 D7 K, j* v6 p8 orespond to that. We cannot change the cards we are dealt, just how we play the hand. If I don’t! M/ y5 \4 i! V9 [9 g7 Z0 Q( p
seem as depressed or morose as I should be, sorry to disappoint you. [laughter] And I assure you I
* u1 \, z6 ?$ x! kam not in denial. It’s not like I’m not aware of what’s going on. My family, my three kids, my wife,# v& M: z/ }& r2 r1 d. \6 x
we just decamped. We bought a lovely house in Virginia, and we’re doing that because that’s a
. I- l. |9 i- c/ r: sbetter place for the family to be, down the road. And the other thing is I am in phenomenally good1 Y" f1 q. W0 f6 k6 @+ G9 F+ ~7 R
health right now. I mean it’s the greatest thing of cognitive dissonance you will ever see is the fact) D/ g0 s' H4 ~" y2 Y
that I am in really good shape. In fact, I am in better shape than most of you. [Randy gets on the0 _$ x/ Z) I4 u- d% {& N
ground and starts doing pushups] [Applause] So anybody who wants to cry or pity me can down and$ _& A3 ^. m1 N2 g1 j
do a few of those, and then you may pity me. [laughter]& W$ C) M, |3 p
All right, so what we’re not talking about today, we are not talking about cancer, because I spent a. P; X9 m  g5 `
lot of time talking about that and I’m really not interested. If you have any herbal supplements or
) ^  P, T2 X  p! }, ?. Nremedies, please stay away from me. [laughter] And we’re not going to talk about things that are! j) l- c" z& I/ {7 Y0 D# Y
even more important than achieving your childhood dreams. We’re not going to talk about my wife," W( o' b* u3 S
we’re not talking about my kids. Because I’m good, but I’m not good enough to talk about that( |+ ?/ m2 ]' r  y! L% J2 e/ {$ _
without tearing up. So, we’re just going to take that off the table. That’s much more important.
" K) G8 U9 t; A, Z8 w* _And we’re not going to talk about spirituality and religion, although I will tell you that I have. C; ~% ^$ C0 P- s6 D! D# k
achieved a deathbed conversion. [dramatic pause] … I just bought a Macintosh. [laughter and
) z' _6 J. ~$ y! \clapping] Now I knew I’d get 9% of the audience with that … All right, so what is today’s talk about$ z8 h. M1 H0 u: J) D+ h$ p# r
then? It’s about my childhood dreams and how I have achieved them. I’ve been very fortunate that  t$ O5 Y0 @* B
way. How I believe I’ve been able to enable the dreams of others, and to some degree, lessons! r& i0 }8 G* a) w' V) J2 k/ t/ r
learned. I’m a professor, there should be some lessons learned and how you can use the stuff you
; n; S3 c* S% z8 f* N; qhear today to achieve your dreams or enable the dreams of others. And as you get older, you may
3 }$ |" N# a: R' Q0 ?( Y' f# ifind that “enabling the dreams of others” thing is even more fun.# a+ k: y& k6 I- n2 E" G# z
So what were my childhood dreams? Well, you know, I had a really good childhood. I mean, no
8 n0 S9 t+ g" s3 w8 N$ N7 |kidding around. I was going back through the family archives, and what was really amazing was, I
0 d3 ]3 K# A5 N% s8 c$ Qcouldn’t find any pictures of me as a kid where I wasn’t smiling. And that was just a very gratifying
+ ~% x/ J, K" N& `0 B: e, Athing. There was our dog, right? Aww, thank you. And there I actually have a picture of me1 `+ U5 b$ e0 w) _; V3 w2 U; T
dreaming. I did a lot of that. You know, there’s a lot of wake up’s! I was born in 1960. When you
! l2 o9 @0 s8 Y- o' l' d+ H9 f( vare 8 or 9 years old and you look at the TV set, men are landing on the moon, anything’s possible.
! w" @* V4 n& I8 \- kAnd that’s something we should not lose sight of, is that the inspiration and the permission to
0 T2 T) _4 Q$ r  q6 K7 @5 |. w5 Bdream is huge.; ^! I* t5 I( j5 E% {
So what were my childhood dreams? You may not agree with this list, but I was there. [laughter]
% p, ^" D% x, V/ x9 MBeing in zero gravity, playing in the National Football League, authoring an article in the World Book
4 H6 P2 q2 L, x/ y  fEncyclopedia – I guess you can tell the nerds early. [laughter] Being Captain Kirk, anybody here have3 G9 M. v) b; X) L  R& @  I
that childhood dream? Not at CMU, nooooo. I wanted to become one of the guys who won the big/ y5 G6 ^) E/ G, u
stuffed animals in the amusement park, and I wanted to be an Imagineer with Disney. These are not
1 T- R0 J% R# psorted in any particular order, although I think they do get harder, except for maybe the first one.  k$ s, [) J! @5 e
OK, so being in zero gravity. Now it’s important to have specific dreams. I did not dream of being an" Q% T8 p7 `4 P' P* ]% N9 c
astronaut, because when I was a little kid, I wore glasses and they told me oh, astronauts can’t have
8 z& b! A0 B) ?6 M7 M* H1 Wglasses. And I was like, mmm, I didn’t really want the whole astronaut gig, I just wanted the floating.
4 C' R( s, \! r' l4 KSo, and as a child [laughter], prototype 0.0. [slide shown of Randy as a child lying in floatingformation
- ], P, E$ O& U0 ?on a table top] But that didn’t work so well, and it turns out that NASA has something. z8 d1 n! ~0 `8 R& F, A
called the Vomit Comet that they used to train the astronauts. And this thing does parabolic arcs,( D+ J8 Q. I, T6 @6 z6 \
and at the top of each arc you get about 25 seconds where you’re ballistic and you get about, a5 f. d  `: }" R& }: R& K
rough equivalent of weightlessness for about 25 seconds. And there is a program where college; @! O$ M) p* I$ b  L
students can submit proposals and if they win the competition, they get to fly. And I thought that. I! O: [1 Z, n- t
was really cool, and we had a team and we put a team together and they won and they got to fly.; j7 r5 y1 a0 U2 F% \. L
And I was all excited because I was going to go with them. And then I hit the first brick wall, because: K% F2 U6 e& k  m' ]- [
they made it very clear that under no circumstances were faculty members allowed to fly with the4 `# u  F- `2 P$ k  r7 @: I
teams. I know, I was heartbroken. I was like, I worked so hard! And so I read the literature very/ K0 }, U; h' j( Y" f! w
carefully and it turns out that NASA, it’s part of their outreach and publicity program, and it turns" X$ s6 w  s; U. C. c
out that the students were allowed to bring a local media journalist from their home town.1 ?: L0 W$ ^- S/ y0 k6 E
[laughter] And, [deep voice] Randy Pausch, web journalist. [regular voice] It’s really easy to get a5 X& N. F- y4 {9 [3 X9 `
press pass! [laughter] So I called up the guys at NASA and I said, I need to know where to fax some6 i6 G0 _5 \) Z0 G/ D
documents. And they said, what documents are you going to fax us? And I said my resignation as
7 u2 A3 v6 G  Kthe faculty advisor and my application as the journalist. And he said, that’s a little transparent, don’t8 R' x% l0 v: z& ?
you think? And I said, yeah, but our project is virtual reality, and we’re going to bring down a whole$ {5 E+ f, p& h
bunch of VR headsets and all the students from all the teams are going to experience it and all those
& ?! \- h6 c# o8 k, T4 P* |8 R9 o! H2 _other real journalists are going to get to film it. Jim Foley’s [who is nodding in the audience] going
" A7 {# m1 N8 voh you bastard, yes. And the guy said, here’s the fax number. So, indeed, we kept our end of the
' k; |( E1 E) cbargain, and that’s one of the themes that you’ll hear later on in the talk, is have something to bring
3 U! m8 r6 F( {: P; Tto the table, right, because that will make you more welcome. And if you’re curious about what9 z2 e, z5 W  W/ u
zero gravity looks like, hopefully the sound will be working here. [slide shows videotape from
& m. i/ s! s" ?1 O- b9 xRandy’s zero gravity experience] There I am. [laughter] You do pay the piper at the bottom. [laugher,% U, ]2 O0 Z$ o/ l" A
as the people in the video crash to the floor of the plane on the video] So, childhood dream number/ b) |/ d! q# B! v0 F/ b' N
one, check.
0 S* p2 S, o+ h/ xOK, let’s talk about football. My dream was to play in the National Football League. And most of
" P% D1 k, L- O7 v) myou don’t know that I actually – no. [laughter] No, I did not make it to the National Football League,
6 ?, U/ O& ~% F7 S/ [" u+ `( r5 Tbut I probably got more from that dream and not accomplishing it than I got from any of the ones+ Q% H9 W8 l6 f2 ]4 w4 n" x
that I did accomplish. I had a coach, I signed up when I was nine years old. I was the smallest kid in
: d( V% m# H! a& s1 y. t. M1 Bthe league, by far. And I had a coach, Jim Graham, who was six-foot-four, he had played linebacker
. F+ t+ J& e, t! R8 {: [- Dat Penn State. He was just this hulk of a guy and he was old school. And I mean really old school.: i/ o! D/ X) c' R# X, w
Like he thought the forward pass was a trick play. [laughter] And he showed up for practice the first+ o/ A1 H+ s( _4 P& E9 f& E
day, and you know, there’s big hulking guy, we were all scared to death of him. And he hadn’t- l! k- S: E2 A
brought any footballs. How are we going to have practice without any footballs? And one of the8 S- q- t* Y' |; F1 B* {
other kids said, excuse me coach, but there’s no football. And Coach Graham said, right, how many
1 V0 ]( o7 w- dmen are on a football field at a time? Eleven on a team, twenty-two. Coach Graham said, all right,
3 g) t$ a4 a* f7 C4 g6 iand how many people are touching the football at any given time? One of them. And he said, right,
  L' u, L% j0 k6 n% L7 P; ~so we’re going to work on what those other twenty-one guys are doing. And that’s a really good
! h8 T9 j+ ?. A6 n3 Vstory because it’s all about fundamentals. Fundamentals, fundamentals, fundamentals. You’ve got
/ |% C5 ]8 k2 Nto get the fundamentals down because otherwise the fancy stuff isn’t going to work. And the other- F1 v7 S( R" w- W7 m
Jim Graham story I have is there was one practice where he just rode me all practice. You’re doing! @6 f+ A+ A0 |
this wrong, you’re doing this wrong, go back and do it again, you owe me, you’re doing push-ups2 R+ x& u% c+ A8 P, Q/ g; V
after practice. And when it was all over, one of the other assistant coaches came over and said,3 C1 _& y2 K0 z. F- u2 ~
yeah, Coach Graham rode you pretty hard, didn’t he? I said, yeah. He said, that’s a good thing. He* Q  U2 c3 _  @. R2 d2 w0 u
said, when you’re screwing up and nobody’s saying anything to you anymore, that means they gave
& h! ]% l2 ?6 r3 _' |3 ]up. And that’s a lesson that stuck with me my whole life. Is that when you see yourself doing8 [# l* A1 J% x: d$ P9 k- G1 @
something badly and nobody’s bothering to tell you anymore, that’s a very bad place to be. Your+ Q% F3 p6 V9 [$ k8 r
critics are your ones telling you they still love you and care.9 }# F7 \9 z: ^: u5 U1 c$ O
After Coach Graham, I had another coach, Coach Setliff, and he taught me a lot about the power of
7 ~9 c: b1 C! R/ S* \enthusiasm. He did this one thing where only for one play at a time he would put people in at like" |6 _9 n" ~; t$ Z! c- H% c
the most horrifically wrong position for them. Like all the short guys would become receivers, right?
/ z( P( B. |% M# ~+ p& @It was just laughable. But we only went in for one play, right? And boy, the other team just never
- i+ L; Q, w7 M- ]" jknew what hit ‘em them. Because when you’re only doing it for one play and you’re just not where8 s, W4 J; `0 A9 u9 ?3 ]; l
you’re supposed to be, and freedom’s just another word for nothing left to lose, boy are you going
- ~! Z7 N" K0 J  [to clean somebody’s clock for that one play. And that kind of enthusiasm was great. And to this2 S6 l) Y* c% c/ j7 v" X. c# u8 w
day, I am most comfortable on a football field. I mean, it’s just one of those things where, you
3 K( b9 U3 b- t2 t5 ~4 B+ ~know, [pulls out a football] if I’m working a hard problem, people will see me wandering the halls0 `6 t/ L( b  k# F2 r$ C
with one of these things, and that’s just because, you know, when you do something young enough
/ w! M& n! ^9 X- j3 J3 g( F3 mand you train for it, it just becomes a part of you. And I’m very glad that football was a part of my9 N; C/ ]/ _+ j; Y. N; C4 ]
life. And if I didn’t get the dream of playing in the NFL, that’s OK. I’ve probably got stuff more
! ?# `+ J4 I2 X6 N- fvaluable. Because looking at what’s going on in the NFL, I’m not sure those guys are doing so great0 S: {+ H2 p. \0 S; ~3 a; B+ E: U
right now.
/ |/ W: Q  @' M3 h3 u1 jOK, and so one of the expressions I learned at Electronic Arts, which I love, which pertains to this, is
( B! F* k% l! p8 ]# h) w: xexperience is what you get when you didn’t get what you wanted. And I think that’s absolutely
& o2 ]# L6 @" i1 `2 blovely. And the other thing about football is we send our kids out to play football or soccer or7 |( h- Q7 U0 [- \; h7 Y" W
swimming or whatever it is, and it’s the first example of what I’m going to call a head fake, or% I7 B( q% @, h1 E0 }, H( `8 z" k
indirect learning. We actually don’t want our kids to learn football. I mean, yeah, it’s really nice that1 H' _  y" q; A* w7 M1 l
I have a wonderful three-point stance and that I know how to do a chop block and all this kind of
# }1 w3 A+ b) D# pstuff. But we send our kids out to learn much more important things. Teamwork, sportsmanship,
/ [) B0 v* O! }: ?* g' m, @1 Nperseverance, etcetera, etcetera. And these kinds of head fake learning are absolutely important.8 T( b3 x0 {/ ^  \( K1 m. V
And you should keep your eye out for them because they’re everywhere.; E7 a9 x, e( I0 x/ m
All right. A simple one, being an author in the World Book Encyclopedia. When I was a kid, we had
6 _- B7 ^( G; Q% U  K& s( hthe World Book Encyclopedia on the shelf. For the freshman, this is paper. … We used to have these
- j. K7 \  F  `+ a$ Y) H' _9 W$ Cthings called books. [laughter] And after I had become somewhat of an authority on virtual reality,
8 J1 k, `" S, C- u  L7 w" N2 a7 tbut not like a really important one, so I was at the level of people the World Book would badger.
, h% S3 e/ z9 h1 v& `! ^: c% bThey called me up and I wrote an article, and this is Caitlin Kelleher [shows slide of Caitlin wearing
; \) Z) y; ], D4 |: Evirtual reality headset manipulating a 3D world], and there’s an article if you go to your local library
) i! B- u, @9 o8 O& F% Z4 Z; xwhere they still have copies of the World Book. Look under V for Virtual Reality, and there it is. And
% [3 m* g" a" A5 t7 ^  ^1 nall I have to say is that having been selected to be an author in the World Book Encyclopedia, I now  f. ]; n, O4 Q9 r
believe that Wikipedia is a perfectly fine source for your information because I know what the
. P  J: [% v+ \' S4 xquality control is for real encyclopedias. They let me in.
5 S6 ^, E% [0 w' q- jAll right, next one. [laughter] [shows slide “Being like Meeting Captain Kirk”] At a certain point you
& ]( @/ p+ \0 z6 E+ Cjust realize there are some things you are not going to do, so maybe you just want to stand close to+ J7 ]0 N' d+ g2 e' p, m" N
the people. And I mean, my god, what a role model for young people. [laughter] [shows slide of# r. W) X$ E, ~/ k8 M; h: W4 V/ M7 t
Captain Kirk sitting at his control station on the Starship Enterprise] I mean, this is everything you5 h0 s: O5 o4 `* G  O: @1 |- o
want to be, and what I learned that carried me forward in leadership later is that, you know, he
$ U- P8 H" X" F' O3 s! G, gwasn’t the smartest guy on the ship. I mean, Spock was pretty smart and McCoy was the doctor and7 f* M+ S" }& k. }. b8 n8 N
Scotty was the engineer. And you sort of go, and what skill set did he have to get on this damn thing
6 Z- \0 N; X$ M( N, |* {2 P. Sand run it? And, you know, clearly there is this skill set called leadership, and, you know, whether or
. S, S+ c4 y! Jnot you like the series, there’s no doubt that there was a lot to be learned about how to lead people" t( O9 [+ N9 w
by watching this guy in action. And he just had the coolest damn toys! [laughter] [shows slide of
6 o6 |# B- b% i( q& tStar Trek gadgets] I mean, my god, I just thought it was fascinating as a kid that he had this thing
' T: B3 \% w% }[Takes out Star Trek Communicator] and he could talk to the ship with it. I just thought that was just" q' \  X' `) U3 X
spectacular, and of course now I own one and it’s smaller. [takes out cell phone] So that’s kind of6 p. Y7 J" h; A9 U3 a
cool.
* D4 V  p' y" N2 e5 Z6 bSo I got to achieve this dream. James T. Kirk, and his alter ego William Shatner, wrote a book, which
" h0 I( p4 v; F9 ]8 fI think was actually a pretty cool book. It was with Chip Walter who is a Pittsburgh- based author( C" L$ J' W# w$ ~
who is quite good, and they wrote a book on basically the science of Star Trek, you know, what has' ?! p8 h( Q9 A+ r7 Y5 F% v* I
come true. And they went around to the top places around the country and looked at various things4 y" a' A: t8 e3 V; D. f
and they came here to study our virtual reality setup. And so we build a virtual reality for him, it
' A- V1 G( K) R8 Olooks something like that. [shows slide of virtual Star Trek bridge from the 1960’s TV show] We put it
$ w/ J  {( u  O3 Gin, put it to red alert. He was a very good sport. [sarcastically] It’s not like he saw that one coming.  a, c# S+ x8 V
[laughter] And it’s really cool to meet your boyhood idol, but it’s even cooler when he comes to you  v4 G6 }2 G; M. V9 ]/ U- d+ i$ b
to see what cool stuff you’re doing in your lab. And that was just a great moment.+ Q% P6 U' C# ^6 C% v
All right, winning stuffed animals. This may seem mundane to you, but when you’re a little kid and$ V- W& h' X' B3 x
you see the big buff guys walking around the amusement park and they’ve got all these big stuffed
+ N* P  ~8 h( R8 b- o/ }# panimals, right? And this is my lovely wife, and I have a lot of pictures of stuffed animals I’ve won.
" a0 \3 T# b+ `) l- @[laughter] [shows slides of several large stuffed animals] That’s my dad posing with one that I won.
. Z% V- K8 p, D( d! _( VI’ve won a lot of these animals. There’s my dad, he did win that one, to his credit. And this was just
9 F+ m  v/ T+ d# i) Da big part of my life and my family’s life. But you know, I can hear the cynics. In this age of digitally0 R. `9 F* N& P8 `+ g) ?
manipulated images, maybe those bears really aren’t in the pictures with me, or maybe I paid+ W$ b3 L. U7 O0 ^" x' o9 r
somebody five bucks to take a picture in the theme park next to the bear. And I said, how, in this
; T' v* H: }# k: U- Y% m; G5 Yage of cynicism can I convince people? And I said, I know, I can show them the bears! Bring them
# q9 B+ @! R$ v9 ]6 H1 n7 bout. [several large stuffed animals are brought onto the stage] [laughter and clapping] Just put them
: b" N, S, c7 C/ Gback against the wall.
% X# r& x, F1 n8 m' BJai Pausch (Randy’s wife):4 {9 L$ E) L' n/ F9 w2 r5 b- m
It’s hard to hear you. [adjusts Randy’s microphone]
% v' P, A/ e5 }% d8 W  [' LRandy Pausch:$ n3 X  p8 h" E7 H) m' W
Thanks honey. [laughter] So here are some bears. We didn’t have quite enough room in the moving0 @3 W( f( Y9 u2 J" ^% c) ?1 c7 O0 W
truck, and anybody who would like a little piece of me at the end of this, feel free to come up and- k( @2 ]8 V" r8 c" ]
take a bear, first come, first served.
% W# ~, E* c4 U0 L& k# w; M; T# mAll right, my next one. Being an Imagineer. This was the hard one. Believe me, getting to zero
# `3 z/ v7 N: J. r1 X5 u4 X$ rgravity is easier than becoming an Imagineer. When I was a kid, I was eight years old and our family* W9 P2 l) Z' A6 D: s+ v. s
took a trip cross-country to see Disneyland. And if you’ve ever seen the movie National Lampoon’s& {% d9 f( S0 C+ i& J
Vacation, it was a lot like that! [laughter] It was a quest. [shows slides of family at Disneyland] And- I( {+ F) D& J! c4 Y0 [
these are real vintage photographs, and there I am in front of the castle. And there I am, and for% H- L% r9 s0 z2 l$ C
those of you who are into foreshadowing, this is the Alice ride. [laughter] And I just thought this was
: J$ h/ l2 p) h1 _$ d6 N+ X; Rjust the coolest environment I had ever been in, and instead of saying, gee, I want to experience this,, d2 A7 D) [. e4 `
I said, I want to make stuff like this. And so I bided my time and then I graduated with my Ph.D.( M. R1 z# Y6 l- o% d! C7 m5 w
from Carnegie Mellon, thinking that meant me infinitely qualified to do anything. And I dashed off
( Z" i8 y& m' m  V1 G% J$ X4 Mmy letters of applications to Walt Disney Imagineering, and they sent me some of the damned nicest
; t0 `+ ]6 {4 r8 Ggo-to-hell letters I have ever gotten. [laughter] I mean it was just, we have carefully reviewed your
1 ]1 U# B' g$ xapplication and presently we do not have any positions available which require your particular6 i/ n  w# C6 R7 n6 y% j' u, s
qualifications. Now think about the fact that you’re getting this from a place that’s famous for guys) Y9 y4 a- Z8 D0 \7 g; j: G
who sweep the street. [laughter] So that was a bit of a setback. But remember, the brick walls are
. _+ ~" E% _" p( v1 Ithere for a reason. The brick walls are not there to keep us out. The brick walls are there to give us
4 z* [* ^/ d( v, q, j4 \a chance to show how badly we want something. Because the brick walls are there to stop the6 |6 e: h2 z$ h- z4 E3 A* i
people who don’t want it badly enough. They’re there to stop the other people.
' f9 g# v/ U& e( _6 ~8 `: uAll right, fast forward to 1991. We did a system back at the University of Virginia called Virtual0 t' Y' T4 V. N- z9 b4 d0 f- x- z: {
Reality on Five Dollars a Day. Just one of those unbelievable spectacular things. I was so scared
+ S( X2 B- q% ?4 Wback in those days as a junior academic. Jim Foley’s here, and I just love to tell this story. He knew5 h, ]% e5 U& r6 j' U  S0 s5 Z
my undergraduate advisor, Andy Van Dam, and I’m at my first conference and I’m just scared to+ o  v: r, |' w0 C
death. And this icon in the user interface community walks up to me and just out of nowhere just
4 l" H2 }: a7 L) J- D5 s: t3 hgives me this huge bear hug and he says, that was from Andy. And that was when I thought, ok,
, d6 C& n$ r! c2 S* f+ wmaybe I can make it. Maybe I do belong. And a similar story is that this was just this unbelievable
* x0 |0 {0 O4 D2 ]$ c/ g+ Nhit because at the time, everybody needed a half a million [dollars] to do virtual reality. And5 E- ~- H. Q* D7 ~
everybody felt frustrated. And we literally hacked together a system for about five thousand dollars
7 R6 ~5 A) U! ]! ~- {: x. W) n! e" O4 bin parts and made a working VR system. And people were just like, oh my god, you know, the  h  ~) F2 r  i" |9 }
Hewlett Packard garage thing. This is so awesome. And so I’m giving this talk and the room has just  i7 m7 }5 ?( d; }! |
gone wild, and during the Q and A, a guy named Tom Furness, who was one of the big names in
* L9 f. c% T1 C( `' e" A7 t, lvirtual reality at the time, he goes up to the microphone and he introduces himself. I didn’t know, I1 @4 D; \, S! a& t* d% F# k" U
what he looked like but I sure as hell knew the name. And he asked a question. And I was like, I’m
  O; r( T9 h& z% xsorry did you say you were Tom Furness? And he said yes. I said, then I would love to answer your
5 b; X2 k* [- k1 ]& [( T5 k) Rquestion, but first, will you have lunch with me tomorrow? [laughter] And there’s a lot in that little
# x& S" Q! k: ~4 M% x! O. b/ W. omoment, there’s a lot of humility but also asking a person where he can’t possibly say no. [laughter]
8 M- k$ ^' X  W! CAnd so Imagineering a couple of years later was working on a virtual reality project. This was top
5 Y/ B. k1 p& ]6 J1 i: l8 n+ Ksecret. They were denying the existence of a virtual reality attraction after the time that the
+ T. L( W" V# J- N6 V2 R3 opublicity department was running the TV commercials. So Imagineering really had nailed this one+ K7 D8 t% {/ X4 Q
tight. And it was the Aladdin attraction where you would fly a magic carpet, and the head mounted
# V* M+ D4 x0 Edisplay, sometimes known as gator vision. And so I had an in. As soon as the project had just, you
$ B3 S% o: L5 Yknow they start running the TV commercials, and I had been asked to brief the Secretary of Defense* @/ _7 v' {5 b: @" _3 ~! s
on the state of virtual reality. OK, Fred Brooks and I had been asked to brief the Secretary of
5 l0 G9 Z3 E  e- ?: r& tDefense, and that gave me an excuse. So I called them. I called Imagineering and I said, look, I’m
! `  q$ k+ X  Nbriefing the Secretary of Defense. I’d like some materials on what you have because it’s one of the. k) n$ l7 G+ t' m9 I1 {6 C' l; ~4 Q8 N
best VR systems in the world. And they kind of pushed back. And I said, look, is all this patriotism+ {& F& |$ ]0 N6 d/ z  d) [
stuff in the parks a farce? And they’re like, hmm, ok. [laughter] But they said this is so new the PR
# g6 r: b$ T& ^: Ydepartment doesn’t have any footage for you, so I’m going to have to connect you straight through
3 S' e- m# A' Oto the team who did the work. Jackpot! So I find myself on the phone with a guy named Jon Snoddy
7 x: y3 K8 \9 b7 Q5 {who is one of the most impressive guys I have ever met, and he was the guy running this team, and
6 N6 n; b8 E! w$ Lit’s not surprising they had done impressive things. And so he sent me some stuff, we talked briefly- J' _" H. F: ^% L3 u$ y
and he sent me some stuff, and I said, hey, I’m going to be out in the area for a conference shortly,
/ J* M: n1 W  C$ P# zwould you like to get together and have lunch? Translation: I’m going to lie to you and say that I
" s4 d: j2 B6 N& m) fhave an excuse to be in the area so I don’t look too anxious, but I would go to Neptune to have
1 ?9 j- Y: b9 W' b" vlunch with you! [laughter] And so Jon said sure, and I spent something like 80 hours talking with all
& C8 Y4 b4 z' x1 j+ m0 Cthe VR experts in the world, saying if you had access to this one unbelievable project, what would
0 S4 R4 H8 d& f- H9 Oyou ask? And then I compiled all of that and I had to memorize it, which anybody that knows me4 `1 a7 \8 |; b3 F9 j8 e, V4 Y- |& x, N
knows that I have no memory at all, because I couldn’t go in looking like a dweeb with, you know, [in
: `6 {' r3 O. t0 Z1 A+ l) idweeby voice] Hi, Question 72. So, I went in, and this was like a two hour lunch, and Jon must have6 D, r' c+ ?9 v* Z/ B. F% @
thought he was talking to some phenomenal person, because all I was doing was channeling Fred
1 v* \7 ~/ U! n. EBrooks and Ivan Sutherland and Andy Van Dam and people like that. And Henry Fuchs. So it’s pretty! G: g% A+ X$ `& u2 l) x. U/ \
easy to be smart when you’re parroting smart people. And at the end of the lunch with Jon, I sort
2 s& r. A$ K" l4 H0 N+ v& pof, as we say in the business, made “the ask.” And I said, you know, I have a sabbatical coming up." t! s7 v2 O* M8 {8 w/ O; E/ f; f
And he said, what’s that? [laughter] The beginnings of the culture clash. And so I talked with him+ ^4 X' i) M0 K9 {
about the possibility of coming there and working with him. And he said, well that’s really good
8 {8 g  |( Y& R5 gexcept, you know, you’re in the business of telling people stuff and we’re in the business of keeping
  p$ e( r, K9 Xsecrets. And then what made Jon Snoddy Jon Snoddy was he said, but we’ll work it out, which I
5 m% o8 [% w( I( creally loved. The other thing that I learned from Jon Snoddy – I could do easily an hour long talk just
( y" P9 G2 X8 J1 F. n8 fon what have I learned from Jon Snoddy. One of the things he told me was that wait long enough
6 F' I6 o( ]5 s, N* |" K: P0 |and people will surprise and impress you. He said, when you’re pissed off at somebody and you’re4 J9 u" a7 _, Q+ {$ k: i/ N
angry at them, you just haven’t given them enough time. Just give them a little more time and
" s+ z8 R8 O8 K  M: u# L# Cthey’ll almost always impress you. And that really stuck with me. I think he’s absolutely right on
6 F2 T+ z  P$ g, n0 K7 j3 xthat one. So to make a long story short, we negotiated a legal contract. It was going to be the first –: j7 \# J; V; d1 v
some people referred to it as the first and last paper ever published by Imagineering. That the deal+ _# l' \6 X/ q. }2 }5 _/ f
was I go, I provide my own funding, I go for six months, I work with a project, we publish a paper.
# X* F& `2 b8 a" w8 b# Y/ EAnd then we meet our villain. [shows slide of a picture of a former dean of Randy’s] I can’t be all, @% A8 J9 `, b- U" u
sweetness and light, because I have no credibility. Somebody’s head’s going to go on a stick. Turns
6 d- I" z- ]( N; d3 K$ S* Hout that the person who gets his head on a stick is a dean back at the University of Virginia. His4 H* M0 G' _& |
name is not important. Let’s call him Dean Wormer. [laughter] And Dean Wormer has a meeting5 B6 i+ l/ |! \3 P+ Z! A! _0 f" B
with me where I say I want to do this sabbatical thing and I’ve actually got the Imagineering guys to
0 B$ I# N) T# P9 b+ ^  e0 P. P) ulet an academic in, which is insane. I mean if Jon hadn’t gone nuts, this would never have been a
: _0 F# o  o8 M. spossibility. This is a very secretive organization. And Dean Wormer looks at the paperwork and he
1 h' |0 a+ R: C5 Y# B6 Wsays, well it says they’re going to own your intellectual property. And I said, yeah, we got the7 P/ J' Y$ v( l9 C
agreement to publish the paper. There is no other IP. I don’t do patentable stuff. And says, yeah,4 @0 |3 x1 B0 m
but you might. And so deal’s off. Just go and get them to change that little clause there and then) L6 l( D; V. V
come back to me. I’m like, excuse me? And then I said to him, I want you to understand how" i! u1 A" \, Y4 V0 v' S4 w
important this is. If we can’t work this out, I’m going to take an unpaid leave of absence and I’m just
+ X# Q5 t4 z7 y7 Wgoing to go there and I’m going to do this thing. And he said, hey, I might not even let you do that. I
+ z  \& r# t5 R3 O  Omean you’ve got the IP in your head already and maybe they’re going to suck it out of you, so that’s
$ c6 t- S& H" _$ A9 Cnot going to fly either. [laughter] It’s very important to know when you’re in a pissing match. And8 @. R6 A  S* }9 e0 n
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.. P: C+ `1 e  _5 v8 r
Do we think this is a good idea at all? He said, I have no idea if this is a good idea. I was like,
8 k0 W- p% X. a1 {0 }. g3 P[sarcastically] OK, well we’ve got common ground there. Then I said, well is this really your call?
" K: i) O* H: KIsn’t this the call of the Dean of Sponsored Research if it’s an IP issue? And he said, yeah, that’s true.
3 C8 C+ V6 Z/ WI said, but so if he’s happy you’re happy? [So he says] Yeah, then I’d be fine. Whoosh! Like Wile E.6 I# ?7 ~8 F7 w
Coyote, I’m gone in a big ball of dust. And I find myself in Gene Block’s office, who is the most
. D; G- A  M1 S5 O7 ]fantastic man in the world. And I start talking to Gene Block and I say let’s start at the high level,& T! F# Q8 H7 h+ V
since I don’t want to have to back out again. So let’s start at the high level. Do you think this is a
3 o# G& \5 ~; `+ _good idea? He said, well if you’re asking me if it’s a good idea, I don’t have very much information.3 `& N! H0 V% b; b0 u
All I know is that one of my star faculty members is in my office and he’s really excited, so tell me5 b2 [* a* z6 k) J. b
more. Here’s a lesson for everybody in administration. They both said the same thing. But think4 M/ E5 h; c; i, w# b* j  G
about how they said it, right? [In a loud, barking voice] I don’t know! [In a pleasant voice] Well, I
6 l# ]3 N# b4 pdon’t have much information, but one of my start faculty members is here and he’s all excited so I
/ U, f( Q, K. V) V: Dwant to learn more. They’re both ways of saying I don’t know, but boy there’s a good way and a bad) E& _9 Y  O; [; p6 n6 U1 h
way. So anyway, we got it all worked out. I went to Imagineering. Sweetness and light. And all’s
# {! r* z: d5 m' N6 Lwell that ends well.
! K. ~  B6 N/ d# pSome brick walls are made of flesh. So I worked on the Aladdin Project. It was absolutely8 }: C1 T/ x+ B8 S( j0 F8 ^: c
spectacular, I mean just unbelievable. Here’s my nephew Christopher. [Shows slide of Christopher4 ^! R- x, W7 X0 A" @) x3 w: {8 o
on Aladdin apparatus] This was the apparatus. You would sit on this sort of motorcycle-type thing.
% I: W7 f. k( u8 T2 f  X' @And you would steer your magic carpet and you would put on the head-mounted display. The headmounted
' w7 @! f! W0 q9 fdisplay is very interesting because it had two parts, and it was a very clever design. To get+ B& a3 R/ x6 m) M4 y6 E/ s
throughput up, the only part that touched the guest’s head was this little cap and everything else
- p0 b; |- O% r* ?2 pclicked onto it – all the expensive hardware. So you could replicate the caps because they were7 D/ L3 M8 I1 M, m# @
basically free to manufacture. [Showing slide of Randy cleaning a cap] And this is what I really did is
8 s& @. L) O( Y$ b4 }0 R' |I was a cap cleaner during the sabbatical. [laughter] I loved Imagineering. It was just a spectacular
0 T) A4 p: w3 ]; ]" x1 uplace. Just spectacular. Everything that I had dreamed. I loved the model shop. People crawling, T6 b# n# F6 M
around on things the size of this room that are just big physical models. It was just an incredible
0 X2 r) k6 o1 t) S7 M: J" G. Z' xplace to walk around and be inspired. I’m always reminded of when I went there and people said,0 _$ D( ]4 A  L
do you think your expectations are too high? And I said, you ever see the movie Charlie and the3 H1 b0 r: h' ~* x9 v! Q% O4 f; M1 i
Chocolate Factory? Willy Wonka and The Chocolate Factory? Where Gene Wilder says to the little
( Q5 [& i1 |. c5 Q, Q# t( oboy Charlie, he’s about to give him the chocolate factory. He says “Well Charlie, did anybody ever( ~# c! q7 O: @; K
tell you the story of the little boy who suddenly got everything he ever wanted?” Charlie’s eyes get+ R8 Q0 w$ k5 [* E$ W$ Q# k' o
like saucers and he says, “No, what happened to him?” Gene Wilder says, “He lived happily ever
$ p; g: ?' [, Q) J& A$ c8 y- I6 Jafter.” [laughter]
3 ]3 r' X% f8 L, VOK, so working on the Aladdin VR, I described it as a once in every five careers opportunity, and I
* V  t: E! H. v8 |stand by that assessment. And it forever changed me. It wasn’t just that it was good work and I got
0 I% `/ y+ i; u  hto be a part of it. But it got me into the place of working with real people and real HCI user interface
  j; Q+ A  _3 r/ H) ^- t) M: s1 Vissues. Most HCI people live in this fantasy world of white collar laborers with Ph.D.s and masters
2 f$ H  P  Z9 S0 c; f2 ddegrees. And you know, until you got ice cream spilled on you, you’re not doing field work. And
0 X0 {. G& I! N/ }( Z+ r( C' t9 @7 m0 @more than anything else, from Jon Snoddy I learned how to put artists and engineers together, and
# ]* ^" G* \; y6 U/ I4 gthat’s been the real legacy.6 M; L0 |% F$ L! D+ O2 L+ k
We published a paper. Just a nice academic cultural scandal. When we wrote the paper, the guys at
5 K* l$ N, A; `4 CImagineering said, well let’s do a nice big picture. Like you would in a magazine. [Showing slide of1 H9 k1 Q8 t3 n! D: C1 n/ i2 Y
first page of the paper, with a photo at the top that spans two columns]. And the SIGGRAPH. [- k4 i7 M0 f8 {5 z( u% E
committee, which accepted the paper, it was like this big scandal. Are they allowed to do that?, H: [, Z; t3 p/ a( z# G
[laughter] There was no rule! So we published the paper and amazingly since then there’s a# X$ h( ^( V8 s9 b4 R
tradition of SIGGRAPH papers having color figures on the first page. So I’ve changed the world in a* c; o7 [: g: V6 q/ v8 h
small way. [laughter] And then at the end of my six months, they came to me and they said, you
) O$ i+ g& }& s0 \9 ^8 hwant to do it for real? You can stay. And I said no. One of the only times in my life I have surprised
$ }# B1 ~4 u4 zmy father. He was like, you’re what? He said, since you were, you know [gesturing to height of a
* _0 B; ?3 Z+ Tchild’s head],this is all you wanted, and now that you got it, and you’re… huh? There was a bottle of$ H/ y# [5 d) _8 T' F: @3 a
Maalox in my desk drawer. Be careful what you wish for. It was a particularly stressful place.
3 L* `0 ]/ n7 a% R0 k- ]7 `. hImagineering in general is actually not so Maalox-laden, but the lab I was in – oh, Jon left in the
7 A8 c8 A' o1 J- z5 E6 vmiddle. And it was a lot like the Soviet Union. It was a little dicey for awhile. But it worked out OK.9 H5 ?" u4 L; D* H% v) h
And if they had said, stay here or never walk in the building again, I would have done it. I would
. j* `2 n+ j/ l# \0 N5 V- B' Khave walked away from tenure, I would have just done it. But they made it easy on me. They said0 j) s& T0 S, J
you can have your cake and eat it too. And I basically became a day-a-week consultant for
1 N. l8 A" O' ^8 CImagineering, and I did that for about ten years. And that’s one of the reasons you should all% I; g# b5 b, v1 K8 q' v
become professors. Because you can have your cake and eat it too.0 F" ?3 J& L$ ~: I' N
I went and consulted on things like DisneyQuest. So there was the Virtual Jungle Cruise. And the
  e$ o7 U0 B* l+ S$ F' b1 [best interactive experience I think ever done, and Jesse Schell gets the credit for this, Pirates of the
# C0 O/ r0 U, _- X# @Caribbean. Wonderful at DisneyQuest.
& c: @2 ]6 [* W0 X% VAnd so those are my childhood dreams. And that’s pretty good. I felt good about that. So then the
8 R) u, m* m+ v. hquestion becomes, how can I enable the childhood dreams of others. And again, boy am I glad I
# x' y! @* H$ [5 k! wbecame a professor. What better place to enable childhood dreams? Eh, maybe working at EA, I
% j  w- |& }# N5 ndon’t know. That’d probably be a good close second. And this started in a very concrete realization6 C& e( M  }8 L" C7 j4 X
that I could do this, because a young man named Tommy Burnett, when I was at the University of
+ b" @; [( v# _, n+ ?6 kVirginia, came to me, was interested in joining my research group. And we talked about it, and he
: n( ?4 M9 z' U1 Xsaid, oh, and I have a childhood dream. It gets pretty easy to recognize them when they tell you.
' _# X; [* H( B* `And I said, yes, Tommy, what is your childhood dream? He said, I want to work on the next Star8 C. M" H& j3 ~3 h* |& y% o
Wars film. Now you got to remember the timing on this. Where is Tommy, Tommy is here today.
4 x; F1 [( {9 F9 @What year would this have been? Your sophomore year.3 z- m# ?; z, F# L
Tommy:
" e& \+ J2 H$ ?, DIt was around ’93.2 `! Z$ O4 ?1 y6 l# t
Randy Pausch:: U& L8 {3 W, b0 J) `
Are you breaking anything back there young man? OK, all right, so in 1993. And I said to Tommy,. j! p- A2 _9 W& a  O
you know they’re probably not going to make those next movies. [laughter] And he said, no, THEY
  x* Q7 t6 n( t; u# CARE. And Tommy worked with me for a number of years as an undergraduate and then as a staff2 v7 f8 T& j  K$ [9 }& Y% \
member, and then I moved to Carnegie Mellon, every single member of my team came from Virginia
/ m8 w0 D# H& F* \* s4 B: n8 Ato Carnegie Mellon except for Tommy because he got a better offer. And he did indeed work on all
3 D; _2 z& g0 K- athree of those films. And then I said, well that’s nice, but you know, one at a time is kind of' r; h: K1 e" {( n
inefficient. And people who know me know that I’m an efficiency freak. So I said, can I do this in: B' ?# d5 O8 p" Y4 h+ H
mass? Can I get people turned in such a way that they can be turned onto their childhood dreams?
& E& f5 ~; z) L5 t' G; ^! HAnd I created a course, I came to Carnegie Mellon and I created a course called Building Virtual& Q; f  Q4 U! Q
Worlds. It’s a very simple course. How many people here have ever been to any of the shows?
+ a9 x) L& W' Q' ^/ J8 L1 f  N[Some people from audience raise hands] OK, so some of you have an idea. For those of you who! _6 W: l- m: c. ?/ g0 ^( g4 P& n
don’t, the course is very simple. There are 50 students drawn from all the different departments of4 o2 w# J$ k- V# Z
the university. There are randomly chosen teams, four people per team, and they change every: L! g0 c9 m  e* ^
project. A project only lasts two weeks, so you do something, you make something, you show) L/ p- R; J$ M
something, then I shuffle the teams, you get three new playmates and you do it again. And it’s
  ^# V& B8 `, x5 vevery two weeks, and so you get five projects during the semester. The first year we taught this
( v2 \  v6 P! r; X8 g3 tcourse, it is impossible to describe how much of a tiger by the tail we had. I was just running the
% u2 z; Q/ G+ L1 H& Acourse because I wanted to see if we could do it. We had just learned how to do texture mapping( `4 ?' o) X& m8 m
on 3D graphics, and we could make stuff that looked half decent. But you know, we were running
0 G) ~! t) D' P  W* n4 ion really weak computers, by current standards. But I said I’ll give it a try. And at my new university4 x7 y# d5 ^/ I- K5 k
[Carnegie Mellon] I made a couple of phone calls, and I said I want to cross-list this course to get all6 R4 l0 Z; f6 A, M" N) [: I
these other people. And within 24 hours it was cross-listed in five departments. I love this1 c# k4 F. ?- N' n3 U8 g
university. I mean it’s the most amazing place. And the kids said, well what content do we make? I3 n' }" s' Y; H, v; @) u5 X* y& [$ t
said, hell, I don’t know. You make whatever you want. Two rules: no shooting violence and no* o0 Y$ `' r# t+ `" _9 ^5 V  l
pornography. Not because I’m opposed to those in particular, but you know, that’s been done with. l4 }; r9 u# R4 Z3 B" ]
VR, right? [laughter] And you’d be amazed how many 19-year-old boys are completely out of ideas
6 p) a7 b* I1 L$ x( |! s( k- G; A" L1 `when you take those off the table. [laughter and clapping]3 ~* X4 }1 U# r5 b( i, z8 k
Anyway, so I taught the course. The first assignment, I gave it to them, they came back in two
- @( c3 q- O; U* h" d! Xweeks and they just blew me away. I mean the work was so beyond, literally, my imagination,
7 k" H" a' `2 M' k# j3 C" f! Z0 hbecause I had copied the process from Imagineering’s VR lab, but I had no idea what they could or
6 \0 Z6 }  x  o+ \couldn’t do with it as undergraduates, and their tools were weaker, and they came back on the first
( v! J& B  s/ y* D# y3 ?3 kassignment, and they did something that was so spectacular that I literally didn’t, ten years as a
) c& y9 h6 @' Dprofessor and I had no idea what to do next. So I called up my mentor, and I called up Andy Van
5 w. Z* `/ J8 A, `Dam. And I said, Andy, I just gave a two-week assignment, and they came back and did stuff that if I
& ?' c3 E  Q) Phad given them a whole semester I would have given them all As. Sensei, what do I do? [laughter]
# _, q* l$ S1 S# ZAnd Andy thought for a minute and he said, you go back into class tomorrow and you look them in/ p- E" Z4 B( g+ ]( C
the eye and you say, “Guys, that was pretty good, but I know you can do better.” [laughter] And that
/ K) i; o% |  h3 d* l6 zwas exactly the right advice. Because what he said was, you obviously don’t know where the bar9 @" v5 i9 {1 E* O4 ?& c0 R
should be, and you’re only going to do them a disservice by putting it anywhere. And boy was that
0 p* W2 u0 J  \# F! hgood advice because they just kept going. And during that semester it became this underground
* E* O9 f- g8 F& O! q8 athing. I’d walk into a class with 50 students in it and there were 95 people in the room. Because it
5 S( T* n: G6 E# U  U  ?7 xwas the day we were showing work. And people’s roommates and friends and parents – I’d never
5 @) A2 A8 I$ i5 X" P: Shad parents come to class before! It was flattering and somewhat scary. And so it snowballed and  a. M7 A- i. t! [
we had this bizarre thing of, well we’ve got to share this. If there’s anything I’ve been raised to do,, O) G2 ^# Q. v; C9 ]" c
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
3 ~$ Z1 `4 J4 @. C, O4 I) Tshow. And we booked this room, McConomy. I have a lot of good memories in this room. And we
) P# P2 }) e( S: Qbooked it not because we thought we could fill it, but because it had the only AV setup that would
8 Q8 Y# `5 ~# g5 P( b5 j" Nwork, because this was a zoo. Computers and everything. And then we filled it. And we more than
, x- S! }9 ]6 \1 M9 rfilled it. We had people standing in the aisle. I will never forget the dean at the time, Jim Morris% d9 p! p; S- g- P- P
was sitting on the stage right about there. We had to kind of scoot him out of the way. And the
- x1 n3 w7 k" q( \# Menergy in the room was like nothing I had ever experienced before. And President Cohen, Jerry# y& E& J$ z8 m1 L8 V- J
Cohen was there, and he sensed the same thing. He later described it as like an Ohio State football
1 D$ N$ s$ B0 [: v0 qpep rally. Except for academics. And he came over and he asked exactly the right question. He4 N7 G9 a5 Y, ?( L0 ^' f
said, before you start, he said, where are these people from? He said, the audience, what) u6 b/ ^* L! e
departments are they from? And we polled them and it was all the departments. And I felt very$ g1 q5 Y. ~4 i9 ?( x/ Z: x9 ?
good because I had just come to campus, he had just come to campus, and my new boss had seen in
. p0 p- H; [- }a very corporal way that this is the university that puts everybody together. And that made me feel
. ?% h) ~2 r& r7 X) T& Ljust tremendous.
+ c9 s. V4 j% j6 h8 lSo we did this campus-wide exhibition. People performed down here. They’re in costume, and we
/ f. t) w( p9 D( h4 v6 pproject just like this and you can see what’s going on. You can see what they’re seeing in the head# q( s5 @* ~$ Q2 l* G
mount. There’s a lot of big props, so there’s a guy white water rafting. [shows slides of a BVW show], A. Y8 v( F  m  O$ x
This is Ben in E.T. And yes, I did tell them if they didn’t do the shot of the kids biking across the1 S* I) P* }. G* w! E  j7 q0 `
moon I would fail him. That is a true story. And I thought I’d show you just one world, and if we can' `6 v4 J) l: j6 {( F" Y
get the lights down if that’s at all possible. No, ok, that means no. All right. All right we’ll just do' h. X- Z/ a+ c) s/ Z
our best then. [Shows “Hello.world” world done in the BVW class, audience applauds at the end.] It
: K( T: x2 l7 r7 swas an unusual course. With some of the most brilliant, creative students from all across the
/ n% i" W* S; M* t6 acampus. It just was a joy to be involved. And they took the whole stage performance aspect of this
, |8 `$ \* C$ S2 R1 C: Xway too seriously [shows pictures of very strange costumes students wore]. And it became this
* i% m4 ?( r9 J% P, C0 K. icampus phenomenon every year. People would line up for it. It was very flattering. And it gave kids  u$ L' t  J- w
a sense of excitement of putting on a show for people who were excited about it. And I think that9 m: V6 X  G$ C2 r5 n3 E( z1 S
that’s one of the best things you can give somebody – the chance to show them what it feels like to
! p% ]& `3 o2 P" qmake other people get excited and happy. I mean that’s a tremendous gift. We always try to
/ L1 G- O4 u$ I8 U3 o# binvolve the audience. Whether it was people with glow sticks or batting a beach ball around… or6 m. X9 O  n; S5 ^) _4 o
driving [shows photo of audience members leaning in their seats to steer a car]. This is really cool.+ ^& C+ D) }1 }' N) F0 k' a/ F6 v
This technology actually got used at the Spiderman 3 premiere in L.A., so the audience was
7 z" C4 E8 V( X% u8 x0 W3 kcontrolling something on the screen, so that’s kind of nice. And I don’t have a class picture from+ \) r: [$ B, F  I& ]7 A
every year, but I dredged all the ones that I do have, and all I can say is that what a privilege and an
% w+ n) x$ x2 \, Z1 x# _3 Chonor it was to teach that course for something like ten years.
( b; N. a$ R2 ^' QAnd all good things come to an end. And I stopped teaching that course about a year ago. People
* G- B7 }) n% z5 d) b/ f# Balways ask me what was my favorite moment. I don’t know if you could have a favorite moment.3 ]& T% j" e1 U/ }/ n. [
But boy there is one I’ll never forget. This was a world with, I believe a roller skating ninja. And one1 {) d" U+ A) B7 `4 r3 R
of the rules was that we perform these things live and they all had to really work. And the moment; Q5 P5 u' A1 M7 J7 k
it stopped working, we went to your backup videotape. And this was very embarrassing. [Shows
* g; H; o7 \9 V# {7 M# ximage of Roller Ninja world presentation] So we have this ninja on stage and he’s doing this roller
8 C' p. b) ^( ?skating thing and the world, it did not crash gently. Whoosh. And I come out, and I believe it was
( c3 K; @# {+ S& oSteve, Audia, wasn’t it? Where is he? OK, where is Steve? Ah, my man. Steve Audia. And talk. j" C$ t. p# x  _" }# c
about quick on your feet. I say, Steve, I’m sorry but your world has crashed and we’re going to go to
! j6 N! x% t# l" Y4 l& Ovideotape. And he pulls out his ninja sword and says, I am dishonored! Whaaa! And just drops!) F* }. w0 j0 M0 T# r
[applause and laughter] And so I think it’s very telling that my very favorite moment in ten years of
# [$ x# ^! W% e* E/ l, uthis high technology course was a brilliant ad lib. And then when the videotape is done and the! m. p4 O4 U% V' k8 D, G9 I6 k
lights come up, he’s lying there lifeless and his teammates drag him off! [laughter] It really was a
3 ]0 w' t# q1 S8 w1 pfantastic moment.
9 `/ P- r8 m, @  q8 `And the course was all about bonding. People used to say, you know, what’s going to make for a
  D6 U4 `) \, [/ I) Sgood world? I said, I can’t tell you beforehand, but right before they present it I can tell you if the# g& x! C% d% t9 N1 t
world’s good just by the body language. If they’re standing close to each other, the world is good.+ A2 ?4 @6 R7 @" Y/ e, f! W
And BVW was a pioneering course [Randy puts on vest with arrows poking out of the back], and I
7 \2 V6 o, V# _" h. S/ ~won’t bore you with all the details, but it wasn’t easy to do, and I was given this when I stepped
! A0 u) t! ^$ U6 H+ ]down from the ETC and I think it’s emblematic. If you’re going to do anything that pioneering you
  L( I# _2 A" E( ?8 S) owill get those arrows in the back, and you just have to put up with it. I mean everything that could
" M' k2 i5 u+ W( n+ }# vgo wrong did go wrong. But at the end of the day, a whole lot of people had a whole lot of fun.
0 k; V. T2 t# `  D2 e+ g5 JWhen you’ve had something for ten years that you hold so precious, it’s the toughest thing in the) m0 X/ S' o0 e1 V4 H  J  o
world to hand it over. And the only advice I can give you is, find somebody better than you to hand
) k$ O6 r8 @' u' Q  Kit to. And that’s what I did. There was this kid at the VR studios way back when, and you didn’t have: }7 V: x4 @7 K; [; \3 C
to spend very long in Jesse Schell’s orbit to go, the force is strong in this one. And one of my* h! L& n  A: j  l* w! q5 d4 p
greatest – my two greatest accomplishments I think for Carnegie Mellon was that I got Jessica/ p0 W' ?/ H3 q
Hodgins and Jesse Schell to come here and join our faculty. And I was thrilled when I could hand this
9 m. f  e4 G6 X4 E" _over to Jesse, and to no one’s surprise, he has really taken it up to the next notch. And the course is
; {( o4 W# R/ D: Z4 Cin more than good hands – it’s in better hands. But it was just one course. And then we really took: p1 F  p3 _; \& t
it up a notch. And we created what I would call the dream fulfillment factory. Don Marinelli and I
* M- z5 r( a! f, q+ r$ l4 ^got together and with the university’s blessing and encouragement, we made this thing out of whole
7 F: w, q( r" H% o1 }4 acloth that was absolutely insane. Should never have been tried. All the sane universities didn’t go2 Z, A; _( y( v/ l: F
near this kind of stuff. Creating a tremendous opportunistic void. So the Entertainment Technology
: E; N& ?) u5 F( l! XCenter was all about artists and technologists working in small teams to make things. It was a twoyear( z+ `/ e/ x  ?% o
professional master’s degree. And Don and I were two kindred spirits. We’re very different –! z; B: L  e8 [2 J" ]
anybody who knows us knows that we are very different people. And we liked to do things in a new! S5 ?" h* b- Z
way, and the truth of the matter is that we are both a little uncomfortable in academia. I used to
1 u, [( W/ F; H5 |; Usay that I am uncomfortable as an academic because I come from a long line of people who actually
) e+ r1 ^, d6 Q: b" r: `% yworked for a living, so. [Nervous laughter] I detect nervous laughter! And I want to stress, Carnegie
7 M! F9 h" U0 wMellon is the only place in the world that the ETC could have happened. By far the only place.
4 N  b# v8 c/ R! g. w[Shows slide of Don Marinelli in tye-dyed shirt, shades and an electric guitar, sitting on a desk next
$ I! u2 j% ]0 A3 x/ P8 n1 l) tto Randy, wearing nerd glasses, button-up shirt, staring at a laptop. Above their heads were the1 v9 k* o9 |" N' k
labels “Right brain/Left brain”] [laughter] OK, this picture was Don’s idea, OK? And we like to refer( O8 ^. g! A2 A2 m" t8 W
to this picture as Don Marinelli on guitar and Randy Pausch on keyboards. [laughter] But we really
$ T& g: `4 ~# }- l1 vdid play up the left brain, right brain and it worked out really well that way. [Shows slide of Don( s/ ?# N" r9 o
looking intense] Don is an intense guy. And Don and I shared an office, and at first it was a small
; l- ]% c' U0 }; P' s4 ^2 d9 roffice. We shared an office for six years. You know, those of you who know Don know he’s an& j# q% f! S8 s
intense guy. And you know, given my current condition, somebody was asking me … this is a8 o3 X' z/ i' h  x9 G" L
terrible joke, but I’m going to use it anyway. Because I know Don will forgive me. Somebody said,5 s/ m4 |( \) f: l3 T6 r/ _, K6 T
given your current condition, have you thought about whether you’re going to go to heaven or hell?7 V% E( b, ~. u/ H2 w( D" E
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.
. v6 S. O( w1 e% cSharing an office with Don was really like sharing an office with a tornado. There was just so much
4 |2 l. S! L9 }- d. fenergy and you never knew which trailer was next, right? But you know something exciting was) w2 l) Y( d& c% C6 p* F
going to happen. And there was so much energy, and I do believe in giving credit where credit is
* }9 h( `. V) cdue. So in my typically visual way, if Don and I were to split the success for the ETC, he clearly gets7 }; N- Q8 r2 W; u( T7 I
the lion’s share of it. [Shows image of a pie chart divided 70/30 (Don/Randy) ] He did the lion’s share
4 [0 x4 a( p; o% s/ L  \: Vof the work, ok, he had the lion’s share of the ideas. It was a great teamwork. I think it was a great
! l4 G* J: p0 K" pyin and a yang, but it was more like YIN and yang. And he deserves that credit and I give it to him7 S# y$ ]) r* E9 ?6 s
because the ETC is a wonderful place. And he’s now running it and he’s taking it global. We’ll talk' u/ @3 W  H: j. d9 H; A* @
about that in a second.
! E; `- H/ n( ^7 q9 o  ~Describing the ETC is really hard, and I finally found a metaphor. Telling people about the ETC is like- i* }0 n& O9 B( o# R1 Z9 J6 j
describing Cirque du Soleil if they’ve never seen it. Sooner or later you’re going to make the5 z% ]. [8 u* a  Y% J' U% H
mistake. You’re going to say, well it’s like a circus. And then you’re dragged into this conversation
" ?! c: e# {# {about oh, how many tigers, how many lions, how many trapeze acts? And that misses the whole" C. Y8 k, V( {, n$ U
point. So when we say we’re a master’s degree, we’re really not like any master’s degree you’ve  D+ W1 ^! |5 n9 N( D4 r2 V
ever seen. Here’s the curriculum [Shows slide of ETC curriculum, listing “Project Course” as the only8 c1 y, [- ]1 K% V
course each semester; audience laughs] The curriculum ended up looking like this. [shows slightly
/ O1 a. E$ `$ Y1 \9 ~more detailed slide]. All I want to do is visually communicate to you that you do five projects in
7 _% r" j$ ^# q/ j, `7 x7 [$ ^Building Virtual Worlds, then you do three more. All of your time is spent in small teams making- N0 w4 x0 M& l0 e$ D9 {
stuff. None of that book learning thing. Don and I had no patience for the book learning thing. It’s
- e! @$ C  G9 |# D1 A. ~a master’s degree. They already spent four years doing book learning. By now they should have
, _9 @4 Y" m9 i9 x9 ^read all the books.
- X: j( P1 b. c. z* z1 r* S. S, ?The keys to success were that Carnegie Mellon gave us the reins. Completely gave us the reins. We
8 G' A7 e4 i' L- d/ n, ohad no deans to report to. We reported directly to the provost, which is great because the provost$ h; G9 H) s2 X5 @8 u! P
is way too busy to watch you carefully. [laughter] We were given explicit license to break the mold.
7 R1 o- q3 N# R5 }It was all project based. It was intense, it was fun, and we took field trips! Every spring semester in
# |( x* \/ ^' ?) N+ M+ CJanuary, we took all 50 students in the first year class and we’d take them out to Pixar, Industrial0 L5 l6 {) q' o
Light and Magic, and of course when you’ve got guys like Tommy there acting as host, right, it’s0 Z4 k! K  `3 ^
pretty easy to get entrée to these places. So we did things very, very differently. The kind of: n( J. W# U! o$ o/ D# S
projects students would do, we did a lot of what we’d call edutainment.
- N. `1 i7 T/ i1 hWe developed a bunch of things with the Fire Department of New York, a network simulator for) d& t: F. j  E  Q" v6 C. L
training firefighters, using video game-ish type technology to teach people useful things. That’s not
& ^3 |: @- k3 T- e- D3 D4 c  a7 M) i- Sbad. Companies did this strange thing. They put in writing, we promise to hire your students. I’ve2 U) W7 Z. ~8 q; `
got the EA and Activision ones here. I think there are now, how many, five? Drew knows I bet.2 o5 K. \( X( X7 A: L
[Drew Davison, head of ETC-Pittsburgh, gestures with five fingers]. So there are five written/ q# b: U; L' m  T( S8 ^
agreements. I don’t know of any other school that has this kind of written agreement with any
& M0 Z6 v" |  acompany. And so that’s a real statement. And these are multiple year things, so they’re agreeing to1 F+ y' ]* @! R* h0 B, n
hire people for summer internships that we have not admitted yet. That’s a pretty strong statement
0 Z( e# L, f- S6 Z( xabout the quality of the program. And Don, as I said, he’s now, he’s crazy. In a wonderful1 o+ H/ }! _. ?5 `( U6 _
complimentary way. He’s doing these things where I’m like, oh my god. He’s not here tonight& {4 S; z, b& ?5 N6 a- a' V" y$ z
because he’s in Singapore because there’s going to be an ETC campus in Singapore. There’s already
7 S$ l/ x  v% _# Jon in Australia and there’s going to be on in Korea. So this is becoming a global phenomenon. So I
1 G2 a: V% C( ~$ R8 B$ Y# j$ l$ C' ethink this really speaks volumes about all the other universities. It’s really true that Carnegie Mellon9 V2 Q$ i# Z/ k+ z- Q; b: S
is the only university that can do this. We just have to do it all over the world now.7 E- @1 \: p1 G
One other big success about the ETC is teaching people about feedback [puts up bar chart where
  t& X3 G5 A0 ]! }( c4 \8 x& T7 vstudents are (anonymous) listed on a scale labeled “how easy to work with” ] -- oh I hear the
/ C9 T" n6 R/ W  d5 |nervous laughter from the students. I had forgotten the delayed shock therapy effect of these bar' q  E( c3 q0 L: v# s  C; Z6 |  `6 D
charts. When you’re taking Building Virtual Worlds, every two weeks we get peer feedback. We put
. ]( o; u- L$ \* P8 gthat all into a big spreadsheet and at the end of the semester, you had three teammates per project,
9 L  M. Y. @* U5 J- K/ W8 i; n, Dfive projects, that’s 15 data points, that’s statistically valid. And you get a bar chart telling you on a
/ k( Y9 r" i( U! M1 zranking of how easy you are to work with, where you stacked up against your peers. Boy that’s hard. d1 e: o0 Z" [0 T/ ^& p7 D
feedback to ignore. Some still managed. [laughter] But for the most part, people looked at that and
; }" i3 Y8 D" M* Dwent, wow, I’ve got to take it up a notch. I better start thinking about what I’m saying to people in
1 r* `; b! a# U+ @& q, n' Gthese meetings. And that is the best gift an educator can give is to get somebody to become self; C/ j% l1 ]; ]+ [" T
reflective.
  {- ~. k! D. Q1 T5 Z# j. x  f: ~9 q" LSo the ETC was wonderful, but even the ETC and even as Don scales it around the globe, it’s still very+ z; C3 V& P, ~7 x" s9 v% \
labor intensive, you know. It’s not Tommy one-at-a-time. It’s not a research group ten at a time.
: H% E/ n" F% m/ I2 nIt’s 50 or 100 at a time per campus times four campuses. But I wanted something infinitely scalable.
# w$ `& B! u& q3 V2 Y& \  ?" bScalable to the point where millions or tens of millions of people could chase their dreams with
5 D" ^4 j  r; U) c) osomething. And you know, I guess that kind of a goal really does make me the Mad Hatter. [Puts on/ W: ?7 t1 H. K9 W# [$ e. \$ W0 n
a Mad Hatter’s green top hat]. So Alice is a project that we worked on for a long, long time. It’s a: e$ v3 s4 g# t- g
novel way to teach computer programming. Kids make movies and games. The head fake – again,5 _1 ^) f/ L4 Z4 C# U
we’re back to the head fakes. The best way to teach somebody something is to have them think
9 B$ H* t) D- _, e! t. jthey’re learning something else. I’ve done it my whole career. And the head fake here is that
" `( G- |7 n4 Z! Fthey’re learning to program but they just think they’re making movies and video games. This thing
+ o' ?7 {$ z% K9 t2 S3 H/ fhas already been downloaded well over a million times. There are eight textbooks that have been
" h4 h% Q& A# _! ~9 Jwritten about it. Ten percent of U.S. colleges are using it now. And it’s not the good stuff yet. The
6 q2 T. D- i, A7 ^good stuff is coming in the next version. I, like Moses, get to see the promised land, but I won’t get
) G# r7 W8 q! c$ v  o% Eto set foot in it. And that’s OK, because I can see it. And the vision is clear. Millions of kids having6 _0 W( Q6 q+ i5 S! ]3 L  D( Z
fun while learning something hard. That’s pretty cool. I can deal with that as a legacy. The next  h& Z4 X9 D$ |8 v8 X# w+ o
version’s going to come out in 2008. It’s going to be teaching the Java language if you want them to
# [: ]) F" C+ zknow they’re learning Java. Otherwise they’ll just think that they’re writing movie scripts. And
, S- ~( L8 N+ e2 ~( owe’re getting the characters from the bestselling PC video game in history, The Sims. And this is
) [+ V1 H4 Z* V* X5 Y( f1 k- {already working in the lab, so there’s no real technological risk. I don’t have time to thank and, G( Y0 J. x- _8 J
mention everybody in the Alice team, but I just want to say that Dennis Cosgrove is going to be9 |5 n0 v/ [: n; b1 D6 C
building this, has been building this. He is the designer. This is his baby. And for those of you who( y0 J/ t7 S8 }
are wondering, well, in some number of months who should I be emailing about the Alice project,9 y2 V# B" V2 [4 c4 o& o  m
where’s Wanda Dann? Oh, there you are. Stand up, let them all see you. Everybody say, Hi Wanda.6 X2 W/ h( j  x
Audience:( w& y& }$ O! p' z$ H
Hi, Wanda.& _2 U. z5 \  s, p
Randy Pausch:
% m* f, S2 H! i; B5 @" G/ E& OSend her the email. And I’ll talk a little bit more about Caitlin Kelleher, but she’s graduated with her
% [& V+ c4 x3 h( u1 fPh.D., and she’s at Washington University, and she’s going to be taking this up a notch and going to* ~/ p5 r2 k* ?2 e' U
middle schools with it. So, grand vision and to the extent that you can live on in something, I will0 n1 v% S& C$ k7 x* B
live on in Alice.7 e( e' m4 W  n, _2 o
All right, so now the third part of the talk. Lessons learned. We’ve talked about my dreams. We’ve+ }6 R2 y' ?8 }$ h* q4 e
talked about helping other people enable their dreams. Somewhere along the way there’s got to be
8 z/ j: q& Z& o% y* Jsome aspect of what lets you get to achieve your dreams. First one is the rule of parents, mentors
2 o6 Q# q( i/ n/ O" }& f& `% ^and students. I was blessed to have been born to two incredible people. This is my mother on her% S8 G7 ^1 ~6 L$ {% a  D
70th birthday. [Shows slide of Randy’s mom driving a race car on an amusement park race course]
0 G, y, K' i. a, \( \[laughter] I am back here. I have just been lapped. [laughter] This is my dad riding a roller coaster
4 e$ N7 @+ F2 }6 l$ L9 von his 80th birthday. [Shows slide of dad] And he points out that he’s not only brave, he’s talented4 D3 m7 ]$ \2 |4 v
because he did win that big bear the same day. My dad was so full of life, anything with him was an+ K6 V, ~/ U: \& T9 S: r# I
adventure. [Shows picture of his Dad holding a brown paper bag.] I don’t know what’s in that bag,
: i+ d5 l# T+ x5 J4 `' y! Ybut I know it’s cool. My dad dressed up as Santa Claus, but he also did very, very significant things# t1 r6 _8 c6 K5 D7 W. W6 G# Y
to help lots of people. This is a dormitory in Thailand that my mom and dad underwrote. And every
* a, y. L0 J( U; F$ f/ syear about 30 students get to go to school who wouldn’t have otherwise. This is something my wife' i! l. S: Y# V& G( C- d! O
and I have also been involved in heavily. And these are the kind of things that I think everybody
! g: m9 }* ^& o, }! `- p) x) k# ^4 V" @ought to be doing. Helping others.
) z& m4 n  f- TBut the best story I have about my dad – unfortunately my dad passed away a little over a year ago
% D7 R) M; F+ Z  }' L4 ^– and when we were going through his things, he had fought in World War II in the Battle of the) ~6 R5 V: J/ M3 ^6 ], w8 P: E$ Y+ @
Bulge, and when we were going through his things, we found out he had been awarded the Bronze
+ e8 ]; N# f: d$ E( `, jStar for Valor. My mom didn’t know it. In 50 years of marriage it had just never come up.$ e% x( p! h% V4 g* @
My mom. [Shows picture of Randy as a young child, pulling his Mom’s hair]. Mothers are people7 E: Z7 j0 A' S& X( ]2 x1 P1 d9 `
who love even when you pull their hair. And I have two great mom stories. When I was here
' b& q. x+ R; E; j' L6 p9 U: ]studying to get my Ph.D. and I was taking something called the theory qualifier, which I can; z8 p5 g# }4 n1 Z0 ~
definitively say is the second worst thing in my life after chemotherapy. [laughter] And I was+ S8 T6 W. n5 w& I
complaining to my mother about how hard this test was and how awful it was, and she just leaned
& t" Z- y  F* o& W) H  lover and she patted me on the arm and she said, we know how you feel honey, and remember when* a2 y/ m7 g. N# B6 g3 k
your father was your age he was fighting the Germans. [laugher] After I got my Ph.D., my mother: P, o4 P/ D* W9 T! E3 j" L
took great relish in introducing me as, this is my son, he’s a doctor but not the kind that helps people.
8 V- P" H1 C( @! C% T  E[laughter] These slides are a little bit dark [meaning “hard to see”], but when I was in high school I
( q8 w8 n0 w/ O( `" Y1 `+ H6 xdecided to paint my bedroom. [shows slides of bedroom] I always wanted a submarine and an" G7 C+ B0 _  N  {7 ?( M
elevator. And the great thing about this [shows slide of quadratic formula painted on wall]) p& e' `. ~) {$ w) e0 p# L8 {
[interrupted by laughter] – what can I say? And the great thing about this is they let me do it. And0 y9 D! K  C) X9 f4 i) ?, V
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# B4 N6 K) J4 F. l
anybody who is out there who is a parent, if your kids want to paint their bedroom, as a favor to me
, s+ |5 I2 ?: B( M# c# j+ i8 l; zlet them do it. It’ll be OK. Don’t worry about resale value on the house.+ a# C3 z# i( M2 F
Other people who help us besides our parents: our teachers, our mentors, our friends, our
. X6 D2 f1 p, I* Icolleagues. God, what is there to say about Andy Van Dam? When I was a freshman at Brown, he
6 @% g; z* L) t( K5 A( B( x: Uwas on leave. And all I heard about was this Andy Van Dam. He was like a mythical creature. Like a9 l. a" f- e1 y- [& s
centaur, but like a really pissed off centaur. And everybody was like really sad that he was gone, but
3 i/ h% M% s" k3 ^( `. Jkind of more relaxed? And I found out why. Because I started working for Andy. I was a teaching* I' w" D9 B8 T$ c: L% [% g& i6 B
assistant for him as a sophomore. And I was quite an arrogant young man. And I came in to some- N6 T$ M, O1 p3 h; y
office hours and of course it was nine o’clock at night and Andy was there at office hours, which is
) b: e3 w. B; e' f1 R) Dyour first clue as to what kind of professor he was. And I come bounding in and you know, I’m just
5 E8 A! _% @6 ?" }: XI’m going to save the world. There’re all these kids waiting for help, da da, da da, da da, da da, da
0 Q7 X  b# Z  r" K; x6 fda. And afterwards, Andy literally Dutch-uncled – he’s Dutch, right? He Dutch-uncled me. And he
! \  \# A7 Y9 q& n3 F# z( Kput his arm around my shoulders and we went for a little walk and he said, Randy, it’s such a shame- N5 o) y' }* |" Z6 G3 {7 w  |
that people perceive you as so arrogant. Because it’s going to limit what you’re going to be able to
8 n, t' _( b0 R3 Gaccomplish in life. What a hell of a way to word “you’re being a jerk.” [laughter] Right? He doesn’t* o2 d% o- k/ D* o% w4 s3 H% u
say you’re a jerk. He says people are perceiving you this way and he says the downside is it’s going
. F7 u( C4 ~6 t) [+ Kto limit what you’re going to be able to accomplish.
7 j" {# `6 ^# }9 K6 l& g# }$ H& LWhen I got to know Andy better, the beatings became more direct, but. [laughter] I could tell you5 D4 I. t% @  k& ^* A
Andy stories for a month, but the one I will tell you is that when it came time to start thinking about
4 m8 z4 n. G+ {$ B. Cwhat to do about graduating from Brown, it had never occurred to me in a million years to go to, i! _- ?: m0 D8 _
graduate school. Just out of my imagination. It wasn’t the kind of thing people from my family did.
$ r  ~* B# G* D, R& qWe got, say, what do you call them? …. jobs. And Andy said, no, don’t go do that. Go get a Ph.D.
% r- x0 ~  w* IBecome a professor. And I said, why? And he said, because you’re such a good salesman that any3 F9 {, Z5 n3 P) F
company that gets you is going to use you as a salesman. And you might as well be selling4 Q3 \: g6 j9 I8 @6 j' i) _. }
something worthwhile like education. [long pause, looks directly at Andy van Dam] Thanks.' ^3 @& @' v6 r
Andy was my first boss, so to speak. I was lucky enough to have a lot of bosses. [shows slide of" J1 C; b2 `" H7 t/ t$ y
various bosses] That red circle is way off. Al is over here. [laughter] I don’t know what the hell& s$ y7 B: D' Q
happened there. He’s probably watching this on the webcast going, my god he’s targeting and he# R4 m% P* C2 p: m- \
still can’t aim! [laughter] I don’t want to say much about the great bosses I’ve had except that they6 y% z" b0 W& j6 u% l4 d
were great. And I know a lot of people in the world that have had bad bosses, and I haven’t had to
; ?. k0 t) J, Vendure that experience and I’m very grateful to all the people that I ever had to have worked for.
, p' A1 T8 B" |5 N5 M9 QThey have just been incredible.( K7 y+ H( E" @( `. e4 \6 h
But it’s not just our bosses, we learn from our students. I think the best head fake of all time comes* C9 r4 a, ^) S& m
from Caitlin Kelleher. Excuse me, Doctor Caitlin Kelleher, who just finished up here and is starting at
5 h$ N  Y" `* q9 `) |Washington University, and she looked at Alice when it was an easier way to learn to program, and; L! w9 v6 x3 T4 g" d1 t3 w& {
she said, yeah, but why is that fun? I was like, ‘cause uh, I’m a compulsive male…I like to make the
3 T, k. ?* w% c7 r' C2 Rlittle toy soldiers move around by my command, and that’s fun. She’s like, hmm. And she was the& h3 B1 ~  i/ ]8 ]8 k" T) w5 R, R+ Q
one who said, no, we’ll just approach it all as a storytelling activity. And she’s done wonderful work
, N$ {) d7 h" J) L4 `' [' P5 H8 vshowing that, particularly with middle school girls, if you present it as a storytelling activity, they’re
% X3 [9 x$ K; D2 X  m! U% ]P a u s c h P a g e | 199 F; o$ s5 ~1 s& j" A9 A0 `3 y. K
perfectly willing to learn how to write computer software. So all-time best head fake award goes to1 I  Y3 n! J6 F; O( t
Caitlin Kelleher’s dissertation.  Z6 S. }+ h5 @
President Cohen, when I told him I was going to do this talk, he said, please tell them about having$ F; p# D. f, a  c
fun, because that’s what I remember you for. And I said, I can do that, but it’s kind of like a fish
( ]4 m& z: Z" V% ^2 \; W4 {talking about the importance of water. I mean I don’t know how to not have fun. I’m dying and I’m' V1 S7 t2 S3 f. O3 U, x) W
having fun. And I’m going to keep having fun every day I have left. Because there’s no other way to
& M' ~+ I  a; p7 f% rplay it.
  A; C+ q" v) D% ~8 |( aSo my next piece of advice is, you just have to decide if you’re a Tigger or and Eeyore. [shows slide: i0 U, @9 h/ A; [( [
with an image of Tigger and Eeyore with the phrase “Decide if you’re Tigger or Eeyore”] I think I’m
) M) F: R+ Y. n% m5 R8 ~clear where I stand on the great Tigger/Eeyore debate. [laughter] Never lose the childlike wonder.
8 G) c% ~4 p8 MIt’s just too important. It’s what drives us. Help others. Denny Proffitt knows more about helping6 x( H6 t# Q; l4 c. q9 e$ [1 O( o
other people. He’s forgotten more than I’ll ever know. He’s taught me by example how to run a3 `  y- z# l8 t% h1 ~; f5 d8 Z
group, how to care about people. M.K. Haley – I have a theory that people who come from large
+ r; X$ N5 W7 Ofamilies are better people because they’ve just had to learn to get along. M.K. Haley comes from a0 e: ^9 u' m( x! P4 k& i# [
family with 20 kids. [audience collectively “aaahs”] Yeah. Unbelievable. And she always says it’s
% f# q- M+ K& ]+ G* O/ Qkind of fun to do the impossible. When I first got to Imagineering, she was one of the people who
3 F. d. h5 S; ~, d! X+ @dressed me down, and she said, I understand you’ve joined the Aladdin Project. What can you do?
; g! {3 [5 h3 W$ J1 _7 V: N4 j) O6 e; Y. mAnd I said, well I’m a tenured professor of computer science. And she said, well that’s very nice
5 X# z) l0 t4 C2 ~6 q% @Professor Boy, but that’s not what I asked. I said what can you do? [laughter]2 K& }7 N* g# X8 z. a# w
And you know I mentioned sort of my working class roots. We keep what is valuable to us, what we& }1 `0 x  T, p# b
cherish. And I’ve kept my [high school] letterman’s jacket all these years. [Puts on letterman’s
1 c% _3 @+ ^/ O7 `% P: f1 wjacket] I used to like wearing it in grad school, and one of my friends, Jessica Hodgins would say, why
% P5 k$ q; X' h; ddo you wear this letterman’s jacket? And I looked around at all the non-athletic guys around me
& n  r* q- q% o& Qwho were much smarter than me. And I said, because I can. [laughter] And so she thought that was
; w* _2 F1 _% J! U! Sa real hoot so one year she made for me this little Raggedy Randy doll. [takes out Raggedy Randy]
. z( |, n; g8 O* d[laughter] He’s got a little letterman’s jacket too. That’s my all-time favorite. It’s the perfect gift for
/ T) b+ q, i; S* E# L  Dthe egomaniac in your life. So, I’ve met so many wonderful people along the way.
+ l; M2 b7 e7 |, d& C6 r6 |+ ?Loyalty is a two way street. There was a young man named Dennis Cosgrove at the University of
( p8 E& {& W7 a2 ~, {  EVirginia, and when he was a young man, let’s just say things happened. And I found myself talking
5 `1 w2 R0 B! _, m& N4 Jto a dean. No, not that dean. And anyway, this dean really had it in for Dennis, and I could never& z$ Z' f, i) @' n
figure out why because Dennis was a fine fellow. But for some reason this Dean really had it in for
. q$ y5 ^2 g* j7 Y9 Y/ @# dhim. And I ended up basically saying, no, I vouch for Dennis. And the guy says, you’re not even& @+ r6 b* A/ {$ T6 }
tenured yet and you’re telling me you’re going to vouch for this sophomore or junior or whatever? I
6 K& O3 i& k% t# J" ythink he was a junior at the time. I said, yeah, I’m going to vouch for him because I believe in him.  x, T$ |, X- \8 w" {+ {' i
And the dean said, and I’m going to remember this when your tenure case comes up. And I said,+ g" s! Q! @2 `# s2 T
deal. I went back to talk to Dennis and I said, I would really appreciate you… that would be good.
+ C+ K3 U6 ?' |5 fBut loyalty is a two-way street. That was god knows how many years ago, but that’s the same  s! n( I$ H- j* M; k4 j3 N3 |2 W4 a' V
Dennis Cosgrove who’s carrying Alice forward. He’s been with me all these years. And if we only
5 D0 ~/ M8 Y8 r! Q/ g5 d( x0 C7 {had one person to send in a space probe to meet an alien species, I’m picking Dennis. [laughter] You! L3 }1 @, j3 u$ [
can’t give a talk at Carnegie Mellon without acknowledging one very special person. And that would5 G2 o/ J: q5 Z6 x
be Sharon Burks. I joked with her, I said, well look, if you’re retiring, it’s just not worth living; k) a# t/ ^0 Z0 O/ V- v
anymore. Sharon is so wonderful it’s beyond description, and for all of us who have been helped by
' ~7 {" l( _! R" Y+ mher, it’s just indescribable. I love this picture because it puts here together with Syl, and Syl is great9 x& V5 Y4 j8 w; @; w, G# z
because Syl gave the best piece of advice pound-for-pound that I have ever heard. And I think all
" ]4 e9 W, [, r! o9 Byoung ladies should hear this. Syl said, it took me a long time but I’ve finally figured it out. When it% r8 J/ d9 `* I* a/ i. v3 Z- A, H
comes to men that are romantically interested in you, it’s really simple. Just ignore everything they# R9 X% m8 {3 |; @$ x0 i
say and only pay attention to what they do. It’s that simple. It’s that easy. And I thought back to
& }0 i$ s7 c0 {my bachelor days and I said, damn. [laughter]
2 ]$ H. ^# [1 Q. C* r6 MNever give up. I didn’t get into Brown University. I was on the wait list. I called them up and they
$ U' v8 O+ W6 H5 n8 X( P6 o& a' Xeventually decided that it was getting really annoying to have me call everyday so they let me in. At* M0 L7 f$ Y0 l, v( A5 m
Carnegie Mellon I didn’t get into graduate school. Andy had mentored me. He said, go to graduate
. Z# \! }+ d2 Aschool, you’re going to Carnegie Mellon. All my good students go to Carnegie Mellon. Yeah, you/ W! V$ }% d  o3 p# @2 I! E! Y
know what’s coming. And so he said, you’re going to go to Carnegie Mellon no problem. What he& R# g* A  P1 R+ J) N3 Y; b1 P: x5 _* ?
had kind of forgotten was that the difficulty of getting to the top Ph.D. program in the country had& W  W7 M4 h7 _( f4 d
really gone up. And he also didn’t know I was going to tank my GRE’s because he believed in me.+ ?7 i8 v0 h! h' G1 ]3 o
Which, based on my board scores was a really stupid idea. And so I didn’t get into Carnegie Mellon.* B6 L9 x9 E3 S5 _" ^7 E- V
No one knows this. ‘Til today I’m telling the story. I was declined admission to Carnegie Mellon.# K. o6 L# s* V' h$ q5 Z  \
And I was a bit of an obnoxious little kid. I went into Andy’s office and I dropped the rejection letter
( y- q. u6 Z6 t# c2 E; Hon his desk. And I said, I just want you to know what your letter of recommendation goes for at
0 q, j/ K5 ^2 {# Q8 ECarnegie Mellon. [laughter] And before the letter had hit his desk, his hand was on the phone and
0 N* o, |' S0 y) `4 u% Uhe 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
& o" x1 a! c( p6 c3 E8 e2 _6 c  h$ hway I was raised. [In a sad voice] Maybe some other graduate schools will see fit to admit me.
: L3 d# k* X; w" `& c[laughter] And he said, look, Carnegie Mellon’s where you’re going to be. He said, I’ll tell you what,
4 ?( R, J5 A6 D+ p/ a8 pI’ll make you a deal. Go visit the other schools. Because I did get into all the other schools. He said,. g6 c) E' X+ n& A& ^# ]2 C& t
go visit the other schools and if you really don’t feel comfortable at any of them, then will you let me9 ]8 A0 L* q  j8 u- {
call Nico? Nico being Nico Habermann [the head of Carnegie Mellon’s Computer Science Dept.] and4 K7 w( W* r+ A! Y7 D) n
I said, OK deal. I went to the other schools. Without naming them by name -- [in a coughing voice]
4 m, {$ `" ]9 j% [( F& s, r5 _Berkeley, Cornell. They managed to be so unwelcoming that I found myself saying to Andy, you3 O+ k% D2 ]. o2 }5 V8 i6 a7 V
know, I’m going to get a job. And he said, no, you’re not. And he picked up the phone and he talked
1 ]0 C3 C/ l: m) q+ J2 y7 B" b: gin Dutch. [laughter] And he hung up the phone and he said, Nico says if you’re serious, be in his7 J: o! s1 I/ M, l
office tomorrow morning at eight a.m. And for those of you who know Nico, this is really scary. So8 f/ r. L- f, A' U' H4 W( d: m2 c6 @
I’m in Nico Habermann’s office the next morning at eight a.m. and he’s talking with me, and frankly I; G8 C& V) a' s% M9 s$ L7 f
don’t think he’s that keen on this meeting. I don’t think he’s that keen at all. And he says, Randy,1 w4 ~( \# ?6 q4 w
why are we here? And I said, because Andy phoned you? Heh-heh. [laughter] And I said, well, since: [; e2 B8 C2 t( D& @4 X6 }% @
you admitted me, I have won a fellowship. The Office of Naval Research is a very prestigious" w" ]5 u2 }% `( w5 U  v7 A
fellowship. I’ve won this fellowship and that wasn’t in my file when I applied. And Nico said, a
9 o( W$ v0 w) j- ^$ cfellowship, money, we have plenty of money. That was back then. He said, we have plenty of7 V# w7 E: U! h  M+ g/ R
money. Why do you think having a fellowship makes any difference to us? And he looked at me.
: N+ {( W4 u9 I0 @2 ?" a- D8 \There are moments that change your life. And ten years later if you know in retrospect it was one of
1 v% \+ w0 J) \! Rthose moments, you’re blessed. But to know it at the moment …. with Nico staring through your0 v% X5 q0 @  ?9 m" O) r
P a u s c h P a g e | 213 N/ |) _. e5 ?6 Q
soul. [laughter] And I said, I didn’t mean to imply anything about the money. It’s just that it was an
$ O& A- [7 H# fhonor. There were only 15 given nationwide. And I did think it was an honor that would be' r$ K3 X: _6 p& ^# d
something that would be meritorious. And I apologize if that was presumptuous. And he smiled.
7 ^7 q5 I2 M4 s5 q8 SAnd that was good.& ^9 ]! w2 q4 V3 S2 X( l
So. How do you get people to help you? You can’t get there alone. People have to help you and I& \: d) M" {' X
do believe in karma. I believe in paybacks. You get people to help you by telling the truth. Being
* t$ y5 p2 T1 u: h  r8 Mearnest. I’ll take an earnest person over a hip person every day, because hip is short term. Earnest& [) P) O1 ]7 A5 o
is long term.
: g+ o6 [" j2 P. W- o! O; SApologize when you screw up and focus on other people, not on yourself. And I thought, how do I) r% T( f0 A. X% A+ F4 r1 l( k
possibly make a concrete example of that? [Speaking to stage hand] Do we have a concrete
, Y' i; G! W$ I- c3 R5 z; {6 Hexample of focusing on somebody else over there? Could we bring it out? [Speaking to audience]0 U8 i3 o6 h* i1 h7 B0 \
See, yesterday was my wife’s birthday. If there was ever a time I might be entitled to have the focus' m; j1 m% k+ j" F# {( H: u
on me, it might be the last lecture. But no, I feel very badly that my wife didn’t really get a proper, l4 ^2 ~; ^0 o) |+ |8 x, P5 _
birthday, and I thought it would be very nice if 500 people— [an oversized birthday cake is wheeled; T  Z; g8 w& j, }% D! ]
onto the stage] [applause] Happy—9 R: l* ]1 Z& `: z9 X+ F" U
Everyone:
, T6 J8 }2 T9 L9 x…birthday to you [Randy: her name is Jai], happy birthday to you. Happy birthday dear Jai, happy
1 N% t- S3 e* Zbirthday to you! [applause]
: S  c6 j2 Q0 t- {$ f' S[Jai walks on stage, teary-eyed. She walks with Randy to the cake. Randy: You gotta blow it out. The
! |; y. j- g  |# N/ M/ n) yaudience goes quiet. Jai blows out the candle on the cake. Randy: All right. Massive applause.]& K$ }& u! q, p
Randy Pausch:
  ~1 ^" d& L% A& ?And now you all have an extra reason to come to the reception. [laughter] Remember brick walls let' u2 g( f0 a- W0 ^$ d
us show our dedication. They are there to separate us from the people who don’t really want to
2 H% k$ p; z. k0 S) }achieve their childhood dreams. Don’t bail. The best of the gold’s at the bottom of barrels of crap.
  r8 d6 @# z7 z: z; L[Shows slide of Steve Seabolt next to a picture of The Sims] [laughter] What Steve didn’t tell you was
  r* c- o- g# a. L1 S# m/ a5 j% ]the big sabbatical at EA, I had been there for 48 hours and they loved the ETC, we were the best, we
& [9 m: ^2 E2 R) [were the favorites, and then somebody pulled me aside and said, oh, by the way, we’re about to
6 k) p: ?4 c( H" Z3 E  Lgive eight million dollars to USC to build a program just like yours. We’re hoping you can help them
' x/ e3 r6 p$ o" M5 sget it off the ground. [laughter] And then Steve came along and said, they said what? Oh god. And9 [$ t# M5 z) a
to quote a famous man, I will fix this. And he did. Steve has been an incredible partner. And we; l2 U( k2 z4 i, E9 P! |
have a great relationship, personal and professional. And he has certainly been point man on
9 K% r6 q& H' u4 G$ Ggetting a gaming asset to help teach millions of kids and that’s just incredible. But, you know, it
% ^3 N1 f4 C6 gcertainly would have been reasonable for me to leave 48 hours after that sabbatical, but it wouldn’t
3 V  ~7 d* P% E0 E/ [have been the right thing to do, and when you do the right thing, good stuff has a way of happening.7 K9 i1 |( r* E3 z, [# h& Z
Get a feedback loop and listen to it. Your feedback loop can be this dorky spreadsheet thing I did, or
- d  w  k# B: _. K  Q4 lit can just be one great man who tells you what you need to hear. The hard part is the listening to it.
( Y* K7 f8 C6 @8 `+ I4 |) t2 HP a u s c h P a g e | 22" ?% D- X* C% H
Anybody can get chewed out. It’s the rare person who says, oh my god, you were right. As opposed
4 @5 ?0 y* |0 a4 r' a* j+ Z" oto, no wait, the real reason is… We’ve all heard that. When people give you feedback, cherish it and
( h7 ]3 U* h9 k, S( @use it.
9 `- B# I  ^5 k: x" `Show gratitude. When I got tenure I took all of my research team down to Disneyworld for a week.& ?9 R( t8 f  f7 k# l6 o
And one of the other professors at Virginia said, how can you do that? I said these people just
+ ~5 s/ D3 A# \% f5 u3 v7 X, Tbusted their ass and got me the best job in the world for life. How could I not do that?- O) J! s+ |/ y! w$ X9 l
Don’t complain. Just work harder. [shows slide of Jackie Robinson, the first black major league
. C- z8 \$ n& V( x( y1 b; P) kbaseball player] That’s a picture of Jackie Robinson. It was in his contract not to complain, even$ m2 E0 k# r, U. q' H3 t& Z
when the fans spit on him.' Y( |# D% t; W, Z, o" ]# \" I
Be good at something, it makes you valuable.
4 j0 s; A' g) f5 ]' U; J! mWork hard. I got tenure a year early as Steve mentioned. Junior faculty members used to say to me,
# P# T. U3 [. F' N7 _9 F3 ~/ Uwow, you got tenure early. What’s your secret? I said, it’s pretty simple. Call my any Friday night in
* u' E$ X, F! ^/ v" U1 E, `my office at ten o’clock and I’ll tell you.
% r. f6 r" ]8 j. [; s6 O0 j8 V3 bFind the best in everybody. One of the things that Jon Snoddy as I said told me, is that you might
8 r5 b, R$ H! s7 shave to wait a long time, sometimes years, but people will show you their good side. Just keep
3 o& ]6 l: o5 k: kwaiting no matter how long it takes. No one is all evil. Everybody has a good side, just keep waiting,
2 d; W! O: i3 S; h+ o; N- G3 Cit will come out.
" G& f4 I3 X& P3 E: z" [5 L, {, YAnd be prepared. Luck is truly where preparation meets opportunity." B, C: T$ O+ r' o
So today’s talk was about my childhood dreams, enabling the dreams of others, and some lessons7 t  z7 W2 \# ~5 q3 e2 z/ v0 M
learned. But did you figure out the head fake? [dramatic pause] It’s not about how to achieve your3 ~+ S0 _$ f% x( G
dreams. It’s about how to lead your life. If you lead your life the right way, the karma will take care
5 G0 E$ Q& S+ t* mof itself. The dreams will come to you.7 F2 G$ p+ ~; Q1 q5 D
Have you figured out the second head fake? The talk’s not for you, it’s for my kids. Thank you all,0 f4 E3 _1 Z. z* c: N0 w, G
good night.
; `( W7 X( \; J. R- z# F2 V# t[applause; standing ovation for 90 seconds; Randy brings Jai onto the stage and they take a bow; they sit
9 u9 J' y. R3 M% z+ u9 Vdown in their seats; standing ovation continues for another minute]* h) s" T; g: b7 e/ i
Randy Bryant:
, V5 G; L* G; ?# jThank you everyone. I’d like to thank all of you for coming. This really means a lot I know to Randy.
" m  g7 Z3 ^( ]9 XHe had this theory even up to yesterday that there wouldn’t be anyone in the room.
' Y, K. G# e! g" m0 G/ l3 fRandy Pausch [from seat]:! z0 k6 S+ N' v# ^( h
After CS50…" m  N8 ]0 I+ r% b& D# q& z/ P
Randy Bryant:
$ U: f% g5 y' {  B# VI know. I’m the other Randy. That’s been my role here for the past 10 years ever since Randy
2 \8 n- h4 h# V: V6 bPausch came here on the faculty. And what I mean by that is, I introduce myself. I’m Randy Bryant
* D# I. K- }; A0 Q4 U3 k6 e: hfrom Computer Science. They go, oh, Randy from CS. You’re the one that does all that cool stuff of7 N9 f8 w' l; t- M4 P
building virtual worlds and teaching children how to program. And I go, no, no, sorry. That’s the
% A* O% u" {5 t% \3 n' y) \8 J: Gother Randy. I’m the wrong one. Sorry, I’m just like a dull nerd. [laughter] So, but I’m very pleased
0 K) M2 D) b2 m1 xtoday to be able to sort of run a brief series of ways in which we want to recognize Randy for his
% G& a% c* z8 h) Q0 dcontributions he’s made to Carnegie Mellon, to computer science and to the world at large. So we
- v6 Y& s) S8 c! \8 Thave a few – it will be a brief program. We have a few people I’ll be bringing up one after the other.
5 d( I8 u4 d2 LI’m sort of the MC here. So first I’d like to introduce who you’ve already met, Steve Seabolt from" C" O) ^2 R' e  u4 `7 }/ Y
Electronic Arts. [applause]
  T# t9 z- J# MSteve Seabolt:/ u% T( I. c" P. F5 F" F
My family wondered whether or not I would make it through the introduction. [voice starts to crack8 f0 m0 H2 |+ F( T9 x
up] And I did that but I might not do so well now. So bear with me. As Randy mentioned, he and I," j( S7 V/ O; |6 n3 f# Q
Carnegie Mellon and Electronic Arts share a particular passion about nurturing young girls and trying& i  z2 x( n3 @3 C
to encourage young girls to stay with math and stay with science. Every geek in the world shouldn’t
+ e8 S- }9 e" L, h& x3 k/ Ebe a guy. You know, it’s such a twist of fate that there’s so many people that are worried about offshoring," E/ E; d7 {" ^2 O. P% Z5 N
and at the same time companies are forced to off-shore, there are fewer and fewer) U' |3 S7 @- U8 ?- J
students entering computer science. And the number of women entering computer science just2 ]9 k0 K7 J, @4 b( T: x: ?
keeps dropping like a rock. There are way too few Caitlins in this world. And Caitlin, we need so2 X2 d$ z2 P) u1 S  U
many more of you. And with that in mind, Electronic Arts has endowed a scholarship fund. It’s the3 n. W; B3 o  X; G* i# t& [$ I& U9 ?
Randy Pausch endowed scholarship fund, established in 2007 by EA. In honor of Randy’s leadership* ]" D9 c  z! G2 e8 q6 n+ A
and contribution to education, computer science, digital entertainment, and his commitment to5 \/ Q, x- i5 C3 l  A
women in technology. This scholarship will be awarded annually to a female undergraduate CMU
$ Q: t! ?8 j8 A- ]1 Kstudent who demonstrates excellence in computer science and a passion in the pursuit of a career in* r1 d% Z, O. u: C- Z4 [
video games. Randy, we’re so honored to do this in your name. [applause]7 K# D( H% D! X* z5 C
Randy Bryant:
. f% M9 J, t" K* vNext I’d like to introduce Jim Foley. He’s on the faculty at Georgia Tech and he’s here representing* Y" ~+ t9 B* L
the ACM Special Interest Group in Computer Human Interaction. Jim. [applause], X6 A) `8 {" \* C6 U
Jim Foley:. D/ G, R" e1 i" @. x
[motions to Randy Pausch to come on stage; gives him a hug] That was for Jim. [applause] ACM, the; f* D5 J! M" p* i/ f. B
Association for Computing Machinery is a group of about 100,000 computing professionals. One of
. r1 S& o1 ~; A; {# u3 `$ x. f3 s8 ptheir special areas of interest is computer human interaction. A few weeks ago, someone who’s a
1 E" z: `( Q+ L- z, H! G% x) kvery good friend of Randy’s wrote a citation which was endorsed by a number of people and went to
$ v2 y2 V) y! y& H; |! ~. `! m( v0 athe executive committee of SIGCHI, which on behalf of the SIGCHI membership, has authorized this, j% \' e: V" F6 A( c
special presentation. The citation was written by Ben Schneiderman and worked on then by Jenny/ F8 Z" @! r9 c% ]  N! D, ?
Preese and Ben Peterson, and endorsed by a whole bunch of your friends and now from the
% {& a2 b" S1 B( eexecutive committee. So let me read to you the citation. Special award for professional
; N: Z  X6 Z5 `  ~% o  w, tcontributions. Randy Pausch’s innovative work has spanned several disciplines and has inspired both6 t! S8 C4 F$ d, o$ W  c' i
mature researchers and a generation of students. His deep technical competence, choice of
+ z, ]; F8 P- f4 T+ \- ^- Cimaginative projects and visionary thinking are always combined with energy and passion. We’ve( y: W0 [+ N5 k" R5 Q- \- p
seen that. From his early work on the simple user interface toolkit to his current work on 3D Alice5 z& m$ W( w2 R8 h0 ^
programming language, he has shown that innovative tool design enables broad participation in5 C* z) \! ?6 ]
programming, especially by women and minorities. Randy Pausch has vigorous commitment to4 H/ s. g; l8 r( w. q* E
engaging students at every level by compelling and intellectually rigorous projects, and his appealing
/ l6 m% [  a% G) n9 m1 u6 K8 G8 Mlecture style for a role-model for every teacher and lecture. Yes, yes yes. [voice starts to crack up]
$ D% \# J9 Y' ?His work has helped make team project experiences and educational computing research more9 S! m0 U* Z  _8 g+ _
common and respected. As a National Science Foundation Presidential Young Investigator, a Lilly
9 \5 Z- @3 C0 j; i* eTeaching Foundation Teaching Fellow, co-founder of the CMU ET Center and consultant for Disney
8 T# E3 O: a- ^" P: iImagineering and EA, Randy’s done pioneering work in combining computing interface design and
1 A' c( V& ?' I# O3 P1 Femotionally rich experiences. For these and many other contributions, the ACM SIGCHI executive2 r; q6 q2 G7 E: B" j0 [  |  V
council is proud to present to Randy Pausch a special award for professional contributions.6 p2 w6 S  R: j! T) B5 C2 C
[applause] [Randy comes back on stage to receive award]7 i4 }- b9 P/ c4 \# J5 h5 H
Randy Bryant:
# l3 m5 _9 R2 d$ ~/ k) CThank you, Jim. Next I’d like to introduce Jerry Cohen, the President of Carnegie Mellon University.
  C1 M7 T7 d: p8 n1 d[applause]
5 b( P5 q4 L+ g# QJerry Cohen:
6 q- b. V; n& L! o& bThank you other Randy. [Tries to move Randy Pausch’s bag of props to the side of the podium] You
7 g# P7 n3 q7 W3 z0 S0 gknow you’re traveling heavy, buddy. Many of us have been thinking about and talking about how
, D( \9 A; O/ Y5 v+ |( T( P' Xwe can recognize you on this campus in a way that is lasting and fitting in terms of what you meant
* o6 \5 E! ]1 Q, xto this university. A lot of people are involved in this. You thought the provost wasn’t paying7 M/ Z. l: G1 [; ?
attention all those years. [laughter] Actually, one of the ways we’re going to remember you is this
  r  ~5 |8 U$ g8 L: e/ P* o) t9 i$50,000 bill for stuffed animals. $47,862.32 for pizza. You’ve made great contributions, Randy, we$ |+ _7 {  E) D$ i. @
really appreciate it. [laughter] One thing we could not do, regrettably, is figure out a way to capture
* y+ p4 S6 k8 o$ Othe kind of person that you are. You’re humanity, what you’ve meant to us as a colleague, as a2 D  a- U, j( C/ }
teacher. As a student. And as a friend. There’s just no way to capture that. There is our memories,
- g  o5 h0 W  u0 _) g; [however. And there is a way to remember you every day, as people walk this campus. So we’ve
7 x' t! X) r! H: T. T/ O( d+ w5 Vcome up with an idea. You’ve done great things for this campus and for computer science and for& c' ^' Y2 X. B
the world. Surely Alice will live on. But the one we’re going to focus on right now is what you’ve
7 a4 |9 ^+ E  u! Y" M1 Idone to connect computer science with the arts. It was remarkable, it was stunning. It’s had
0 N5 j, y  g" P8 C6 C, jenormous impact, and it will last, I daresay forever. So to recognize that, we are going to do the( {) M( c4 A% ?
following. Good job, other Randy. [laughter, as Randy Bryant gets the projector to show the next
9 {' Y" F, s' _slide] In order to effect this, we had to build a building. [Shows slide of mockup of Gates building] A, e: \7 d# r9 b1 H8 [+ ]
hundred million dollar building which will allow us to do the following. You’ll note, by the way, to
) M3 @; a+ B) H+ borient people. So the Purnell Center for the Arts is the home of the School of Drama. That modern
' o1 h* B8 H; O: k, [looking new thing, half of which has a green roof, is the new Gates Center for Computer Science.
1 E9 l0 B/ v, V. mAnd we had long planned to connect these two physically, both to allow people to get down from0 w5 F# `; d- T7 C4 a5 t( A' n
the cut to lower campus, and you have to admit it carries tremendous symbolic importance. Well! J- g, q% n" e
on behalf of the Board of Trustees of Carnegie Mellon and on behalf of the entire university, I’m) y9 ~9 A8 ~# w' l; T  P8 E
pleased to announce today that the bridge connecting these two will be known as the Randy Pausch* N$ I& t4 e8 \7 l
Memorial Footbridge. [shows slide of mockup of bridge] [applause] Now actually based on your talk
5 z# b3 y( _' L. Rtoday we’re thinking now about putting up a brick wall up at either end, and let students see what
' l6 V2 w  t' fthey can do with it. [laughter] Randy, there’ll be a generation of students and faculty to come here
; B5 w9 B: I* ~) t  cwho will not know you, but they will cross that bridge, they will see your name, and they’ll ask those! [* l/ S) V9 H, o
of us who did know you. And we will tell them that unfortunately they were not able to experience: W% B. @/ U9 M  o* u
the man, but they are surely experiencing the impact of the man. Randy, thank you for all that! ?  I. b8 A: b/ B& _- y
you’ve done for Carnegie Mellon. We’re going to miss you. [applause] [Randy walks on stage and! M! @7 W) c9 S- c% |
gives Jerry a hug]$ D0 m& l+ l: a* w  \
Randy Bryant:
* k! I1 G2 A/ @So every good show needs a closing act, and so to do that I’ll invite Andy Van Dam. [applause]% u, z/ W! A9 q9 ?7 Y/ F( J, S- l
Andy Van Dam:* o! P$ J# {  |1 _- Q, h: W
Oh how I love having the last word. [applause] But to have to go on after that fabulous show, I don’t
5 U% U- P, [+ R3 U: B: |know whether that was good planning. Well I started in Brown in 1965 and it has been my pleasure) G! o8 \8 U  }% K: y. d3 H5 V
and great joy not just to teach thousands of undergraduates and some graduates, but also to work
2 c. c' j" @9 Fone-on-one with a couple hundred of them. And over 35 have followed me into teaching I’m proud
/ L) L, f+ ~, z- A) g# m" nto say. Out of those best and brightest it was very clear that Randy would stand out. He showed
% D5 v/ A6 ^# l% N+ m7 Y8 ^5 v8 dgreat promise early on and a passion about our field and about helping others that you’ve seen+ s7 e$ n3 k) U& H& H0 a2 M: |
amply demonstrated today. It was matched by fierce determination and by persistence in the face
5 A2 M* h) @/ `/ ]* u* E0 mof all brick wall odds. And you’ve heard a lot about that and seen that demonstrated as he fights
# p' G4 \' o# `: q! pthis terrible disease. Like the elephant’s child, however, he was filled with satiable curiosity, you- l: T7 g6 X) Y# f& U" w8 o; o
remember that. And what happened to the elephant’s child, he got spanked by all of his relations,% J& [& R3 o- r3 |6 t
and you’ve heard some of that. He was brash, he had an irrepressible, raucous sense of humor,# `  y/ j. _0 P; {9 H' a0 [" B8 ]
which led to the fantastic showmanship that you saw today. He was self-assured, occasionally to# c- A7 H% M7 Z) m/ ]% \: B
the point of outright cockiness. And stubborn as a mule. And I’m a Dutchman and I know from1 N4 o1 B6 T% r( o/ Q
stubbornness. The kind way to say it is he had an exceedingly strong inner compass, and you’ve
8 s' K9 ]! E' L' C7 o$ dseen that demonstrated over and over again. Now, having been accused of many such traits myself,
( A$ I" `& _5 y' O2 a- I- c' DI rather thought of them as features, not bugs. [laughter] Having had to learn English the hard way, I2 Y/ \5 Y) f3 P1 O
was a fanatic about getting students to speak and write correct English from the get-go. And Randy- s( l7 E+ _, x  T2 C+ b
the mouth had no problem with that. But he did have one problem. And I’m having a problem with
. O, t& O# d2 }1 ~my machine here, here we go. [gets slide to project on screen]. And that was another part of my" a7 @* E8 X# B5 F& ]( ?
fanaticism which dealt with having American students learn about foreign cultures. And specifically# t( m7 C; E, c
about food cultures, and more specifically yet, about Chinese food culture. So I would take my+ F1 b! g2 Y3 r7 ?5 l7 Y
students to this wonderful Chinese restaurant where they cooked off the menu using a Chinese. n5 l) t! w- i3 e" L; I4 Q5 R
menu. And I tried to get Randy to sample this. But would Mr. White Bread touch that stuff?
* [) B& s1 M% t[laughter] Absolutely not. And worse, he refused to learn to eat with chopsticks. I was chairman at, |( @, q7 J4 b4 }
the time and I said, Randy, you know, I’m not going to let you graduate if you don’t learn to eat with
( o5 N) D/ u, L3 }chopsticks! [laughter] It’s a requirement, didn’t you see that? He of course didn’t believe that. And1 d, Y/ v7 j" h" L! i
so it came time for graduation and I handed him his diploma. And this was the picture one of my
4 a* g! v7 K  b! Cfriends took. [Shows slide of Brown University commencement, 1982, Randy dressed in his cap and
8 K+ w6 Z5 c4 y% J% W1 ^' Vgown, opening his diploma, his mouth wide open in surprise] And what you see is Randy opening his
; [3 E9 ?; D) L$ \' vdiploma to show it to his parents, and there was an autographed copy of the menu in Chinese and7 T) b0 P, ^* W7 X
no diploma. [laughter, applause] It was one of the few times I got the better of him, I have to/ i, o$ k; j& s& P( F3 a
confess. Well here we are today, all of us, and hundreds and hundreds of people all over the5 y( g; e- {( S8 |* ^
country, I dare say all over the world, participating in this great event to celebrate you and your life.* x, z/ h2 E# Q; D; A! Y1 p
Randy is the person, the Mensch, as we say in Yiddish. Your manifold accomplishments as a model
5 E& g* X6 C% [academic, especially as a mentor to your students. Your Disneyland expeditions not only were* W$ i1 v' g: u: Y. \3 q
unique but they are legendary. You have more than fulfilled the terms of Brown University Charter,. C, p& f' R0 ^1 @, Y
which are: to discharge the offices of life with usefulness and reputation. Your utter devotion to
% ]1 y' a. |9 \) {4 Ryour family and your career are exemplary, and continue unabated as you cope with the immensity
  \: L, R  |# Z# _  Jof your situation. You exemplify undaunted courage and grace under pressure. The most terrible; B; Y$ c7 ~& u7 F8 M$ ^: I$ o. i
pressure one can imagine. Randy, you have been and you will continue to be a role model for us.
2 ]2 T" G% F- N' y4 E4 d" ?' C; N. d[Voice starts cracking up] Thank you so much for all you have done for us. And to allow us to tell
$ h1 w) e& Q% f! `you privately and in such a public way how much we admire, honor, and indeed love you. [applause]
9 e/ P' J" ?5 E, `- G* H[standing ovation]
$ o4 G' ~) v2 M' s1 D; U( A/ ]% d. w% ]# w
[ 本帖最后由 billzhao 于 2008-11-16 18:02 编辑 ]
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 楼主| 发表于 2008-11-16 18:05 | 显示全部楼层
李开复:引领你的一生(关于Randy Paucsh的最后一课)
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7 }$ N" K# N8 W; Y( V! W
# a6 Q% B) a4 y  }* P% }      前不久,我的同学兰迪·波许教授在我们的母校卡内基·梅隆大学做了一场风靡全美的讲座,题目是《真正实现你的童年梦想》。该讲座的视频在不同视频网站上被点播了上千万次。《华尔街日报》把这次讲座称为“一生难觅的最后的讲座”。在美国一些高校里,“最后的讲座”是著名教授退休前的最后一课。兰迪教授并没有准备退休,但是他患了胰腺癌,只剩下几个月的生命。这次讲座对他来说,竟真的是他一生中“最后的讲座”了。
; a5 }" {- ]7 N2 m7 _$ {8 m5 U4 W+ r* U
      我的亲友纷纷在电子邮件中向我推荐兰迪教授的此次讲座。我和女儿一起看了讲座的视频。看完后,我们感动地含着眼泪,同时又因为感悟和兴奋而相视一笑。我们像每一个听过讲座或看过讲座视频的人一样,激动的心情久久不能平息。我经过电子邮件找到兰迪,他慷慨地答应让我们把他的视频加上中文字幕,并授权让我们把视频、讲稿和讨论放在“我学网”与中国的网友分享(查看下载兰迪教授的演讲视频及讲稿请点击这里)。
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8 T3 c, g& f& ~; I) V       对这样一次出色的讲座,我的感触很深,也领悟到了许多东西,在这里和大家分享一下。, U2 A3 S( P2 G- I9 \; E$ a
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幽默、乐观、无惧; Y# K) V/ `+ P# P! u
      兰迪和我同年进入卡内基·梅隆大学计算机学院的博士班。在学校里我们交往并不深,但是他是我们那届最出风头的学生。他外向、健谈,幽默、有表演天才,还有很强的亲和力。在他的讲座里,我们很容易发现这些特点。/ i8 W& B5 {! i! t  C) j

3 \2 Q. u; I2 D( M" y      虽然兰迪已经进入癌症末期,但他还是在讲座中保持着他惯有的幽默感。演讲开始时,他说:“癌症让我比你们身材更好。”他还开玩笑说:“临终的人常会在死前信奉宗教。我也是这样。前几天,我买了一台苹果电脑。(我现在信奉苹果教。)”
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      我们常说,乐观的人看到半杯水时,总会说杯子是“半满”而不是“半空”。乐观的兰迪教授甚至在杯中只剩一滴水时,也依然能看到那仅存于最后一滴水中的美,并因此而感恩。也正是因为有了这样的乐观天性,他才能够在自己的生命结束前,留下这样一次“照亮他人”的“人生作品”。- e$ S( M( u) y
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       兰迪说:“对于无法改变的事情,我们只能决定如何反应。我们不能改变手里的牌,但是可以决定如何出牌。”这充分体现出他乐观进取的心态和宽广的胸襟。我想,任何人如果有了这样的心态,无论是面对病痛的折磨还是人生的失意,他都能用一次次漂亮的出牌实现自己最大的价值。
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兰迪幽默的最后一课。有些人说他像金凯利。6 C+ {& _. J5 |) @. y9 U" I- u
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         你的梦想,自己会来找你
  Q1 m/ |  _9 V. O( Z& A* S       兰迪教授此次讲座的主题是“真正实现你的童年梦想”。他谈到,小时候他的梦想是在嘉年华会上赢得超大型的动物玩偶,体验无重力的环境,参加全国橄榄球联盟的比赛,当星际迷航记中的库克船长,写一篇百科全书的文章,以及加入迪斯尼梦幻工程队设计迪斯尼乐园的云宵飞车。这些梦想看起来杂乱无章,但是,在那些纯真的孩子的心里,这些东西才是最真实,最不受外界影响的渴望。而对这些梦想的追寻就是follow your heart(追随真心)。
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       我和兰迪电子邮件交流中谈到今天许多年轻人把“财富”当作自己的梦想。他说:“只有极端缺乏想象力的人才会把财富当作自己的童年梦想。”何况,研究结果告诉我们追寻你真正的梦想反而比追逐财富可能得到更多财富。
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- Z, S  B+ _$ C; o1 n       兰迪教授感谢他的父母,因为是父母让他成为了一个心中有梦想的孩子,并给他创造了一个宽松的成长环境,鼓励他尝试和创新,帮助他建立自信心。他的父母甚至让他在自己房间的墙壁上随意涂鸦。是他父母创造的良好环境让他的梦想得以清晰呈现,并在一生中不断督促、引导他前进。如果每个人都像兰迪那样从小心中有梦,那么“你的梦想,自己会来找你”。
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: a: T1 Q5 P; N/ ?$ R5 s       令人惊讶也令人羡慕的是,兰迪这些儿时的梦想后来竟然大部分都实现了。其实,这些看似荒诞不羁的梦想反映了他潜意识中隐藏的人生理想,也折射出他特有的思维方式与个性特点。例如,写百科全书的梦想意味着他希望做一个学识渊博的人,想体验无重力的环境体现他的好奇,为迪斯尼乐园设计云霄飞车的梦想代表了他对高科技的痴迷,而参加全国橄榄球联盟比赛的梦想则反映出他对团队、运动和竞争的兴趣。这些个性特质、思维方式和人生理想最终成就了今天的兰迪。
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) j) p7 [  S) V# b3 x0 \; X& v兰迪在讲座中把他赢的超大动物玩偶搬上讲台,并赠送给观众。# n9 E* N$ C3 F9 M* }

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兰迪小时候的卧室。父母让他在墙上涂鸦。( S' c2 b2 {( C

; L/ ?* [: r# K1 i' ^) d3 L* T$ L           砖墙挡不住追梦人
# Y6 l. \% }" [' n       在追寻梦想的途中,肯定会困难重重。兰迪教授在讲座中不止一次地使用一面咖啡色的砖墙来代表较难克服的困难。在追寻梦想的过程中,这面墙常常挡在我们面前。但这面墙所能够挡住的其实是那些没有诚意的、不相信童年梦想的人!兰迪教授说:“这面墙让我们知道,为它后面的梦想而努力是值得的。这面墙迫使我们向自己证明,我们是多么渴望墙后面的宝藏——我们的梦想!”
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% Q8 v' t8 r$ V7 n! B* j$ B: ~       兰迪教授认为,要得到砖墙后面的宝藏,你必须想尽办法,努力工作,还需要甘冒风险,克服自己的惰性,离开自己的“安乐窝”,积极主动地去争取和开拓。例如,当年轻的兰迪收到卡内基·梅隆大学的据信时,他想尽办法安排了一次与卡内基·梅隆计算机系主任见面的机会,并当面说服了那位系主任,使之收回成命,录取了他。
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+ o! F% N( `5 F        兰迪教授的一个梦想是进入迪斯尼的梦幻工程队设计云霄飞车。虽然他多次收到迪斯尼公司寄给他的据信,但他没有气馁,并保留这些据信,用它们激励自己继续努力。终于有一次,兰迪在一个学术会议上发表演讲后,一位梦幻工程队的工程师向他提问,兰迪是这么回答他的:“我很愿意回答你的问题,但我想先问你:明天可以和我一起共进午餐吗?”这一次午餐终于让梦幻工程队认识了兰迪,此后不久,他就得到了梦幻工程队的工作邀请。
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       兰迪只有一个梦想没有实现——他没能成为职业橄榄球运动员。但是他认为,从这个没有实现的梦想中得到的东西,可能比从已经实现的梦想中得到的还要多。他虽然没有成为职业球员,但是打球帮助他建立了信心,培养了努力的习惯,提高了团队合作的能力。对此,他总结说:“如果你非常想要某一样东西,而你努力过了却又没有得到它,那么你收获的就是宝贵的经验。 ”0 W$ j. F! g4 T% E& U

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兰迪演讲中屡次出现的砖墙。0 g# k& C5 |9 a& V9 Z
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匹茨堡职业橄榄球队教练听了兰迪的演讲后,特别请他参加球队的排练,
; B: X4 X$ d, o帮助兰迪圆最后一个未完成的童年梦想。
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3 l; n& H4 X- I% g     最伟大的事:做老师,助人圆梦( J/ b! E0 l! h2 u' J7 f2 t
      如果完成梦想是重要的目标,那么,什么是伟大的目标呢?在兰迪看来,帮助别人完成梦想,做个助人圆梦者是真正伟大的目标。兰迪说:“年长之后,我发现帮助他人实现他们的梦想是唯一比实现自己梦想更有意义的事情。”
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4 u' u" X( m1 x% c       从这个意义上说,老师往往是最好的“助人圆梦者”。兰迪教授特别感谢他的恩师引导他肩负起教育这个伟大的任务。他的恩师曾对他说: “你应该做教授。你是一个天生的推销员,任何一个得到你的公司都会利用你赚钱,不让你推销有价值的东西太可惜了。你还是做教授去推销教育吧!”( H" H  d! T* Q8 m& _
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       成为教授后,兰迪在卡内基·梅隆开了一个“圆梦”的课程,让各种科系的学生在一起用虚拟现实技术,开发一项完成童年梦想的项目。为了这个做“圆梦者”的机会,他最后拒绝了梦幻工程队的邀请。为了长大后发现的新梦想,他放弃了儿时的梦想。但是,如果不是追逐儿时的梦想,他又怎么会找到长大后的新梦想呢?
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( N8 v' g8 B' x  O: q8 a$ R: \       在他的“圆梦”课程中,一批学生只用了两个星期就完成了一般团队要做一个学期的项目。对此,兰迪倍感惊讶,但他只是对学生们说:“你们做的不错,但是我知道,你们可以做得更好。”有这样的老师,学生不但可以实现梦想,甚至可能超越梦想。$ x2 ?3 F* V. D/ W: V7 S
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       我曾经雇用过一名兰迪的学生。他对我说:“兰迪是我所见过的老师里面最有激情的,他能够用生动有趣的例子解释复杂的科技。更重要的是,他真的在乎他的学生,他希望他们能发挥他们的潜力,实现他们的梦想。”
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卡内基·梅隆学生排队参观兰迪“圆梦”课程项目的演示。# P  o$ E  [9 R  h/ r

9 B/ |' U  L( `. I+ @( g     心存感激,心存包容  F1 J$ u; p& G
       兰迪有一颗感恩的心。他劝我们随时心存感激,多想别人,少想自己。他在讲座中说,昨天是他妻子的生日,为了准备此次讲座,他没有好好替妻子过生日。随后,他当场推出了一个大蛋糕,请他妻子上台,亲自唱“祝你生日快乐”,以此来表示对妻子的感谢。0 `4 h, [" F$ I8 p

" S4 a) C8 J2 q/ @5 C% J7 b       他对他的恩师也心存感激。他记得,当他是一个不讨人喜欢又自以为是的本科生的时候,他的恩师利用和他散步的机会,亲切地搂着他肩膀说:“兰迪,你很有才华,可是有人觉得你很傲慢。这真遗憾,因为这样会限制你的发展。”这句话改变了他的一生。7 N+ u9 }3 P4 i! x: z
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       此后,在兰迪的工作和生活中,他不但处处心存感激,而且善于包容他人。他说如果不是当时老师包容他,耐心地劝他,而只是批评他,他的傲慢可能一辈子都不会改过来。有些人让你生气,但只要你有足够的耐心,就总能发现他们性格中闪光的地方。他说:“如果你对某个人有意见,那是因为,你还没有给他足够的时间。”在这里,包容是感恩的第一步。
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% d( b& p, i; |# H) M. U       兰迪教授的感恩之心,以及他的真诚打动了他周围的人。我的一位朋友参加了那次讲座,他说:“我从来没有见过那么多成年人在一起失控并痛哭。连我们最严肃的校长和一位最严厉的教授都被他打动而失声落泪。”我的朋友还说,兰迪曾经花很多时间帮助少数民族,资助贫困的亚洲国家的教育,希望给更多的人实现梦想的机会。
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) R7 j% M: \$ [+ b8 F兰迪在演讲中推出给他妻子的生日蛋糕。
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                    引领你的一生0 j1 o8 e; M* z: x3 x, d" y
            关于此次讲座,兰迪教授有两个结论:
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+ r8 b/ I7 r% ?) n: g       第一:“今天的演讲不是讲如何实现你的梦想,而是如何引领你的一生(lead your life)。如果你正确引领你的一生,因缘自会带来一切你所应得的。”
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# s3 c3 u7 v) v6 a. A      我认为“Lead your life”这句话既简短有力又意味深长。 “Lead your life”而不是 “live your life”,也就是说,不要只“过一生”,而是要用你的梦想引领你的一生,要用感恩、真诚、助人圆梦的心态引领你的一生,要用执着、无惧、乐观的态度来引领你的一生。如果你做到了这些,因缘会给你一切你所应得的。* N/ J: V& w1 J% \& X$ A3 n3 s
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          孔子说: “未知生,焉知死 。” 而兰迪仿佛想通过他的“最后的讲座”告诉我们:“如果你尽力地去实现你的梦想,那你才是真正地生活过了。对一个曾经真正生活过的人,死亡是一点也不可怕的。”7 Z$ M1 s7 Y  F' z4 F
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         第二:“今天的讲座其实不是为你,而是为了我的孩子。”
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         这是多么珍贵的遗产呀!我相信他的三个孩子会依据他“最后的讲座”来引领他们的一生。我也相信,经过互联网的传播,更多的孩子会因为看过兰迪的“最后的讲座”,而去追寻自己的梦想和更加精彩的一生。
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      我十一岁的女儿看完“最后的讲座”后告诉我:“我要写下我童年的梦想。”我拍拍她的头,赞赏她的计划。她又说:“我可以去画我房间的墙壁吗?”我提醒她:“你小时候画的还不够吗?”她吐吐舌头说:“我知道。谢谢你以前让我画。”+ ^. U  y+ P2 m# q
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      希望我们的孩子能和兰迪的孩子一样,用梦想引领他们的一生。
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On July 25, 2008 Pausch died from pancreatic cancer

老杨团队 追求完美
Randy Pausch, the Carnegie Mellon University computer science professor whose final lecture inspired millions, died early today in Virginia of pancreatic cancer.
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( H) S: J  H- e$ D7 {/ sDr. Pausch, 47, who turned the lecture into a book, said that no one would have been interested in his words of wisdom were he not a man in his 40s with a terminal illness, leaving behind a wife and three young children.: V( r  C. V7 u' T! ], }" |

, r( ^# _2 C, K, ZAccording to Dr. Pausch's Web site, a biopsy last week revealed that the cancer had progressed further than expected, based on recent PETscans.
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"Since last week, Randy has also taken a step down and is much sicker than he had been," the Web site said. "He's now enrolled in hospice. He's no longer able to post here so I'm a friend posting on his behalf because we know that many folks are watching this space for updates."# W8 }; j8 S' n

1 D6 _& w3 q) ^Last fall, Dr. Pausch delivered the lecture at CMU, which still posts it on its Web site. The lecture has attracted more than six million viewers.( l' ?4 v% ~" }
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In the year preceding the lecture, he had gone through rounds of chemotherapy and radiation, but refused to give in to morbidity or self-pity. Instead of focusing on the cancer, he talked about how to fulfill childhood dreams and the lessons he learned on his life's journey.
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In his 10 years at CMU, he helped found the Entertainment Technology Center, established an annual virtual reality contest and helped start the Alice program, an animation-based curriculum for teaching high school and college students." o! X* y; q2 ^3 |1 M* l

) K1 N4 I' s) G: q# Y- Z( I5 sAfter the lecture, he moved to Chesapeake, Va., to spend his remaining time with his wife, children and family.
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Steve Seabolt, a vice president at video-game maker Electronic Arts and one of Dr. Pausch's best friends, was with him when he died at 4 a.m. today. Dr. Pausch was lucid until near the end, he said, and even went up and down the steps a couple times at home yesterday, "although he had minimal energy."; g2 P; m! x1 e9 C4 y0 \  ?# O3 F
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Dr. Pausch had stopped taking chemotherapy in recent weeks but was investigating a possible vaccine therapy up until the end of his life, Mr. Seabolt said.
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"Randy had an enormous and lasting impact on Carnegie Mellon," said university President Jared L. Cohon. "He was a brilliant researcher and gifted teacher. His love of teaching, his sense of fun and his brilliance came together in the Alice project, which teaches students computer programming while enabling them to do something fun -- making animated movies and games. Carnegie Mellon -- and the world -- are better places for having had Randy Pausch in them."
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  ]; ^* O* e* M, H" V/ i" G+ DWith the help of Wall Street Journal columnist Jeffrey Zaslow, Dr. Pausch wrote a book, "The Last Lecture," which was published earlier this year and has now been translated into 30 languages. He elaborated on his lecture and emphasized the value he placed on hard work and learning from criticism. His words were intended as a legacy for his young children.: p" O& o3 S7 P% T
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In May, Dr. Pausch spoke at the Carnegie Mellon University commencement. He said a friend recently told him he was "beating the [Grim] Reaper" because it's now been nine months since his doctor told him he would die in six.( e- |$ [$ a6 w# b2 e7 f

$ E' V0 ]2 I) I"But we don't beat the Reaper by living longer. We beat the Reaper by living well," said Dr. Pausch, who urged the graduates to find and pursue their passion. He put an exclamation point at the end of his remarks by kissing his wife, Jai, and carrying her off stage.; t: G, n  j, h9 q  G& {/ B5 m
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Mr. Zaslow said the commencement was the last time he saw Dr. Pausch. He recalled that Dr. Pausch was weak enough from his cancer that he had to lie down on a couch before and after his appearance, but as he often did, he mustered his energy for the public appearance, "and he was excited and happy."
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9 K4 f+ G- J) B6 s3 n5 d8 ]Mr. Zaslow said he had become obsessed with Googling Dr. Pausch's name each day on the Internet to see how many new Web sites were devoted to him. In an e-mail exchange they had about a month ago, Dr. Pausch "said to me, 'Will you stop Googling me and go hug your kids?' So I did."* u' o3 j0 I: x# N  H
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In addition to his wife, Dr. Pausch is survived by his children, Dylan, Logan and Chloe. Also surviving are his mother, Virginia Pausch of Columbia, Md., and a sister, Tamara Mason of Lynchburg, Va. The family plans a private burial in Virginia. A campus memorial service is being planned. Details will be announced at a later date. In September, Carnegie Mellon announced a plan to honor Dr. Pausch's memory and his work as "a tireless advocate and enabler of collaboration between artistic and technical faculty members." CMU is to build the Randy Pausch Memorial Footbridge, which will connect the Gates Center for Computer Science, now under construction, with an adjacent arts building.* r3 W$ Q# g; [# z$ Y

" U& g. W( s0 S9 Q5 ?$ ]The family requests that donations on his behalf be directed to the Pancreatic Cancer Action Network, 2141 Rosecrans Ave., Suite 7000, El Segundo, Calif. 90245, or to Carnegie Mellon's Randy Pausch Memorial Fund, which primarily supports the university's continued work on the Alice project.
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