User:Alexander Roidl/more chapter

Main research question: What are the poetic qualities of software? why is it important to examine? (Why engage with software in an artistic sense)

including

• meta-function of software
• non-functional software
• misused software
• crashing software

Software Art and Cultures (readme book) “software art is the political and critical art form of contemporary culture”

Software Art poetics of software iPod / low, obsolete tech neural networks narrative of computation

if you take software out of its function it can reveal something about itself suddenly it is not threatening anymore

digital objects

the promise of the neural network (what do we expect from software / neural networks?) We want it to be clever but not to intervene into our life too much. So we expect Software to be better than ourselfs, but at the same time not, cause we are afraid of everything that might be better than us. So what is the promise of Software? Automation of boring tasks? It should assist you as good as possible, but no more.

“For instance, it has become a truism to emphasize that code is not merely functional but can have poetic qualities, and political significance.” (read_me, p. 161)

“leading to the idea of software as potential literature” (read_me, p. 162)

“any essay or piece of code is only ever a work in progress and should be subject to active criticism and upgrade” (read_me, p. 162)

Is there a poetic to neural networks? What is the poetics of neural networks? And how does it change how we perceive neural networks / machine learning … ?

Software Poetics

my main interest: 1. how software influences people, with or without knowing. 2. how versatile software is in its creation and execution. 3. how software works and how it creates infrastructures 4. what are the poetics of software? How can it help to understand the software itself.

How much are we dependent on / influenced by software. In times, when Software becomes more and more abstract and black boxed.

Nonfunctional Software What, if Software has no function? Software plays an important role in our lives. Yet it is such a versatile and subtle ….. We can get a spark of what this means and how Software really works, when it fails or is taken out of its context. So in the following I want to argue that for a serious engagement with software it is also necessary to look at the nonfunctional and the stuff that is between the pixels and conducting paths. Software is primary made to function, but what if software fails or malfunctions on purpose?

The influence of Software on our life Example of Lieferando / GPS navigation The drivers follows the route of the software, which may not necessary make sense, but still the human relies on the software to calculate the right system. Which is also a trust in the data that has been given to the system. (This is separate from hardware, in the sense, that when hardware fails, you would immediately know and figure out other ways to reach the aim. But if software fails, it doesn’t necessarily mean that one can notice it. You would for instance reach the wrong goal or go the wrong way)

Whiteboxing (see http://thepiratebook.net/category/articles/)

Programming Code Considering Software as a product, Code would consequently represent its material. As David M. Points out Code does not simply consist of one single representation. Besides the layer of human readable code, there is also the form of machine code and when the code is actually being executed on the machine. The first of the mentioned states, the textual representation of code, that is in a human readable format, written in a specific programming language, can also exist as literature. Following the history of computation it is mostly agreed on that code is more than just machine instructions. (The Philosophy of Software Code and Mediation in the Digital Age David M. Berry, p. 28ff.) Knuth for examples also argues for an aesthetic in code distinguishing between ‘good’ and ‘bad’ code. (look in The Art of Programming, Knuth)

1. malfunctions of software

While The Alliance for Code Excellence imagines ‘[a] world where software runs cleanly and correctly as it simplifies, enhances and enriches our day everyday life is achievable’ I argue that the malfunctioning of code can also be something positive that is revealing and holds a value. The great thing about an unstable setup can be that the user knows that there is a potential for crashes and therefore engagement is necessary. At the point when it crashes you will be able to get a glimpse of the inner workings of software.

A quine: A computer program that displays its own code. Techno-Galactic Guide to Software Observation

Shorter and cleaner code / one line C program a one line neural network

Software as a Service (SaaS) From free software to proprietary software to software on servers, which doesn’t even hand out the executables. The risk of this server software is of course that it gathers data and leaves backdoors for the software owner to change the software. This means it is equal to spywhere as pointed out by Richard Stallman. http://bostonreview.net/richard-stallman-free-software-DRM