However, any would-be (I'm talking zero experience) programmer that looks to this for inspiration is going to be demotivated by not being able to come anywhere near this progress. Because it's not possible. It's deceiving. The website presents itself as a resume or a portfolio, and in a way it does feel like it's selling something: herself.
Yes Conway's Game of Life, Pixel Paint, etc. can be made in surprisingly limited time and code, but not by a novice programmer. We're talking about having to grasp variables, lists, function calls - basic stuff - that given no prior knowledge may take weeks alone.
This is someone with a solid understanding of programming and who has borrowed (very skillfully I'll say) from tutorials and examples - very good skills to have, but separate from her claim.
Not true at all. I had no prior programming knowledge when I began Objective-C and all of that was grasped within a week no problem. Pointers were easy to get. Arrays couldn't be easier (even multi-level). Things are so much easier when you aren't sitting in a class and getting told things are hard. Cause most of the time they aren't.
Also, I don't really understand the suspicion this gets here. Where's the win in giving someone the Spanish inquisition for posting something cool? What's the upside of this skepticism? Does it accomplish something useful? It's not like this person is trying to sell you something or has any reason to deceive you.