Proposal Reviews from MIT Press
From Maze
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Review #1:
This is a brief but highly appealing proposal. 10 PRINT CHR$(109+RND(1)*2); : GOTO 10 (hereafter 10 PRINT) offers a close reading of a single eponymous line of code, using it as the basis for a wider critical agenda addressing home computing, a particular platform (the Commodore 64), digital textuality, and procedural literacy. This oscillation between the micro- and macroscopic levels of its reading practices is one of the two identifying features of the project, the other one being the adventuresome group authoring method that is proposed. 10 PRINT is not an edited collection; it is a monograph, or more properly a *heterograph*, which, while multi-authored, will speak with a “single voice” (as the proposal has it). Nick Montfort, an experienced scholar and editor, assumes responsibility for the nuts and bolts details of coordinating the process.
The strength of this particular proposal and an editor’s confidence in the group’s ability to succeed must rest largely on the quality of the participants. In this respect the proposal is unassailable, as it gathers many of the most important contributors to the rapidly emerging fields of software studies, platform studies, and critical code studies. There is a healthy disciplinary diversity reflected, though one notices only two of the twelve contributors are women.
If brought to fruition, I believe 10 PRINT has the potential to become widely adopted as a classroom text; it may also find a broader audience among computer hobbyists and historians, as the authors suggest. The timetable is ambitious, and it will be interesting to see whether the multi-authored nature of the process is a help or a hindrance in terms of how successfully it will be met. In short, while the project entails an element of risk, the quality of the contributors (many of whom are established MIT Press authors) coupled with the potential broad appeal of the final product make it a risk well worth taking on the Press’s part, and I recommend an advance contract with the final MS subject to the Press's normal review procedures.
Comments on Review 1
Review #2:
1. What have the authors/editors tried to accomplish, and to what extent does the manuscript achieve this?
Taking its starting point in a one-line Commodore 64 BASIC program, the proposed book discusses a number of issues in software studies.
2. Is the work original and the scholarship sound?
The "seeing the world in a grain of sand"-approach is interesting and provocative. The proposal suggests many interesting discussions that could come from this.
3. Will the work be a significant contribution to the field? If so, in what way is it significant?
It is a problem for computer science in general that it comes across as a very abstract field, distant from practical applications. This book promises a more tangible, accessible, and direct connection to the materiality and creativity of programming.
4. To what audience(s) is the book addressed?
The obvious primary audience is readers already interested in software studies; then computer scientists and hobbyists familiar with the Commodore 64 and other home computers of the era.
5. What are the best books already published on the subject, and how does this work compare with them?
The authors provide a good list of competing works in the book proposal.
The proposed book is different in that its starting point from a single line of code provides a kind of texture and concreteness not present in the competing books.
6. What is your opinion of the manuscript’s level, style, organization, and length?
The short format and the focused starting point seem to work well together. In the absence of a sample chapter, it is hard to judge the final writing style though.
7. How could the manuscript be improved? Can you cite specific sections or chapters that need revision?
The weakest point of the proposal is this: The manuscript is clearly organized around a single-line program. This works and communicates well. Beyond that, however, it is not clearly communicated what the book is about.
The book would be much improved if it had a clearer focus: I agree that the proposed chapters make much sense in relation to the chose line of programming, but I lack an explanation of why these specific chapters were chosen. The author's should come up with a succinct explanation of the book's focus. This would make it easier to edit the book, and it would make it easier for potential readers to understand what the book is about.
8. Are there any chapters/sections that stand out as being particularly weak or particularly strong?
It is hard to evaluate the style of the chapters, since no sample chapter was provided. The discussion paper that was provided is interesting, but it also shows that a lot of editing is needed to make a coherent reading experience out of separate voices. I would like to see the authors formulate a clearer plan about how to make the text come together in this way.
9. What is your overall reaction to the manuscript?
- I do not recommend publication by the MIT Press.
*I recommend publication, provided the revisions suggested in this review are satisfactorily made.
- I recommend publication. Suggestions for revision are offered, but their adoption should be left to the discretion of the author and the Press.
- I strongly recommend publication.
Comments on Review 2
1-2 Paragraphs on the Goals of the Book
Our understanding of 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 and executes 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 distinct 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, and the practices of programmers during a particular era of computing. We demonstrate how a deep reading of a program can be facilitated by writing programs to explore these specifics. The book also connects this program to computational practices and concepts across platforms and throughout history, providing insight into what is compelling about computation from an aesthetic standpoint and why people would write computer programs of this sort at any time and in any context.
