There are now many websites, such as Flickr and YouTube and blogs, that support user-generated content, enabling people to create and share text, graphics, photos, and videos. But, for the most part, Web 2.0 does not include interactive content. People interact with web-based animations and games all of the time, but few people can create and share their own interactive content.

The Scratch project from the MIT Media Lab aims to change that, making it easy for everyone, especially children and teens, to create and share interactive stories, games, and animations on the web, in the participatory spirit of Web 2.0. With the Scratch programming environment, users snap together graphical programming blocks (see figure) to control the actions and interactions of rich media content, including photos, graphics, music and sound. Then, they upload their interactive creations to the shared Scratch website, where other members of the Scratch community can interact with the projects right on the site, and download the original source code to examine or modify the project…