Comment by bitwize

I got hooked on the feeling of power and control. When you're five years old (the age I was when I started programming "seriously"), it's an age when people start expecting things of you, making demands of you, but you are in no position to do likewise to others. The computer is a machine, not a person, but it's more like a person than other machines are (which is part of why it's so mystifying). It can follow instructions, answer questions, and remember things. It can be communicated with. It is like a rather stupid genie that can only accept meticulously formulated wishes, but will carry them out faithfully to the limit of its power. So a kid like me, finally confronted with something that will do whatever he wants, can spend hours formulating wishes for the genie to construct whatever his imagination can dream up.