Proposal Reviews from MIT Press
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== 1-2 Paragraphs on the Goals of the Book == | == 1-2 Paragraphs on the Goals of the Book == | ||
| − | Our understanding of different cultural production, and of our culture overall, has been greatly advanced by studies that focus on a single work, such as Barthes's ''S/Z'', Beckett's ''Proust'', Arnheim's ''Genesis of a Painting: Picasso's Guernica'', and Foucault's ''Ceci n'est pas une pipe.'' ''10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10'' brings the power of these approaches to expressive computation, offering a deep reading of a one-line BASIC Commodore 64 program. By analyzing this short program from multiple viewpoints, the book explains how to read code deeply and shows the insights that come from doing so. Instead of discussing software merely as an abstract formulation, this book focuses on a specific program that exists in different printed variants, operates in specific ways, and runs on a particular platform. At the same time, the book considers how the program engages randomness, iteration, visualization, and other wider topics. The eponymous program is treated as a particular cultural artifact, but it also serves as a Rosetta Stone that gives us important access to the phenomenon of creative computing and the way computer programs exist in culture. | + | Our understanding of different cultural production, and of our culture overall, has been greatly advanced by studies that focus on a single work, such as Barthes's ''S/Z'', Beckett's ''Proust'', Arnheim's ''Genesis of a Painting: Picasso's Guernica'', and Foucault's ''Ceci n'est pas une pipe.'' ''10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10'' brings this sort of attention to expressive computation, offering a deep reading of a one-line BASIC Commodore 64 program. By analyzing this short program from multiple viewpoints, the book explains how to read code deeply and shows the insights that come from doing so. Instead of discussing software merely as an abstract formulation, this book focuses on a specific program that exists in different printed variants, operates in specific ways, and runs on a particular platform. At the same time, the book considers how the program engages randomness, iteration, visualization, and other wider topics. The eponymous program is treated as a particular cultural artifact, but it also serves as a Rosetta Stone that gives us important access to the phenomenon of creative computing and the way computer programs exist in culture. |
The analysis and critical reading undertaken in ''10 PRINT ...'' shows the importance of considering specifics (the Commodore 64, BASIC, the context of creation, the PETSCII character set) in discovering how a program relates to a platform, the means of publication and dissemination, the values of programmers during a particular era of computing. The book also connects this one specific program to computational practices and concepts across platforms and throughout history, providing insight into what is compelling about computation from an aesthetic standpoint, why people would write computer programs of this sort at any time, and why it is valuable to read computer programs at many levels, with an awareness of their contexts of creation, transmission, and use. | The analysis and critical reading undertaken in ''10 PRINT ...'' shows the importance of considering specifics (the Commodore 64, BASIC, the context of creation, the PETSCII character set) in discovering how a program relates to a platform, the means of publication and dissemination, the values of programmers during a particular era of computing. The book also connects this one specific program to computational practices and concepts across platforms and throughout history, providing insight into what is compelling about computation from an aesthetic standpoint, why people would write computer programs of this sort at any time, and why it is valuable to read computer programs at many levels, with an awareness of their contexts of creation, transmission, and use. | ||
