Software

An artist who parodies commercial software development is able to influence perception and the thinking of people to whom otherwise she would not have access.An artist creating or using software "differently" is able, at least for the time being, to conquer the omnipresence of commerce and to introduce art into such spheres - spheres in which its presence wasn't previously contemplated. (…) dedicated to the artistic contemplation of software: its creation, modification and deconstruction. Alexei Shulgin, Olga Goriunova http://www.runme.org/categories/+existing_software_manipulations

Behind the Blip: Software as Culture. … Another pre-existing area that offers insights for an understanding of software as culture is the tradition of accounts of their work by programmers. Key texts are Larry Wall's 'Perl as a Postmodern Programming Language' and Ellen Ullman's 'Close to the Machine'. Both of these in their own ways document the interrelation of programming with other formations, cultural, social, aesthetic. These are drives that are built into and compose software rather than use it as a neutral tool. Matthew Fuller http://www.backspace.org/iod/mutation.html