At 15 I never brought it further than writing small basic programs on a tandy 'pocket' computer.
The first time dabbling in languages was writing a 6809 macro assemlber, but that had to wait until I was 17. Those really young kids cranking out code at that level really amaze me, I don't think I had even heard of LISP at that age.
Thank you Patrick. Wow. Really, that one word says it all, but on a little longer note, and from a bit more than twice your age, you impress the hell out of me.
Not just because of your age, but mostly because you have things so 'together' at your age.
Most kids at the age of 15 are laying the seeds for the wasting of the next decade of their lives, you decided to lay the foundation for the rest of your life instead.
Keep going! And don't burn out! (please) The energy pit is not endless, even if it seems to be so. I've found that out the hard way.
I had not heard of LISP at 15, either. I already knew I loved programming, but what I was doing was rudimentary. I can't imagine how a teenager finds his or her way into such advanced programming. I personally need a formal computer science education for that.
Patrick Collison is really impressive, and I had the fortunate chance to randomly meet him at a coffee shop (he probably doesn't remember me). He is a YC alum, having founded and sold Auctomatic. He later created and sold an iPhone app that was a locally compressed copy of Wikipedia. Very cool. http://collison.ie/
