[rococode]

Minecraft, and in particular Bukkit (API for coding server plugins), is by far the single biggest factor in my own development as a programmer. Literally hundreds of hours spent coding plugins for my server, starting from copy-pasting tutorials in the early days and eventually being able to build fairly complex projects on my own. It's formed my personal belief that being able to visually see the effects of code and being able to write code that augments things that are already interesting are great ways to encourage young kids and teens to code.