Begin forwarded message:
> From: David Mandl <[email protected]>
> Date: Sun Aug 17, 2003 11:16:54 PM US/Eastern
> To: Rachel Greene <[email protected]>
> Subject: Press Release: "Behind the Blip" by Matthew Fuller
>
> For Immediate Release
> September 1, 2003
>
> BEHIND THE BLIP: ESSAYS ON THE CULTURE OF SOFTWARE
> by Matthew Fuller
>
> Software actively shapes the way we know, see, and do things in the
> world. In BEHIND THE BLIP, a far-reaching and strikingly original
> collection of essays on the "culture of software," new-media critic
> Matthew Fuller sets out some of the ways in which people are opening
> this process up to greater debate and experimentation. BEHIND THE
> BLIP brings together insights from social studies of science and
> philosophies of technology, with accounts and ideas from hackers,
> artists, inventors, programmers, and other users of software.
>
> BEHIND THE BLIP surveys the potential grounds for software criticism
> and proposes some currents in software that call for new ways of
> thinking about the subject. It also offers numerous case studies
> taken from Fuller's own experience participating in the production of
> a popular experimental web browser; a site parasiting search engines
> to hack racism on the net; and a large-scale disassembly of the
> world's "favorite" writing machine, Microsoft Word. BEHIND THE BLIP
> refuses to stop asking questions or settle for what's served up on the
> desktop. Along the way, fundamental possibilities for technology,
> computers, and culture are set loose.
>
> ************
>
> "While most institutions are still trying to figure out what to do
> with 'new media,' some of the best new-media artists and theorists
> have already moved on to the next paradigm: the study of software
> culture. Matthew Fuller's excellent collection is the first monograph
> in this emerging field. Combining solid understanding of theory and
> modern art history with the groundbreaking practical work in software
> culture, Fuller brilliantly analyzes the tools which we all use every
> day to interface with the world and each other: web browsers, search
> engines, word processors. What Fuller gives us is not just a usual
> book of theory but rather a kind of software–a 'critical help system'
> to help us understand what is really going on behind the menu and the
> windows of our computer screens."
> –Lev Manovich, Visual Arts Department, University of California, San
> Diego;
> author of THE LANGUAGE OF NEW MEDIA (MIT Press)
>
> ************
>
> "A compelling hybrid of sci-fi style merged with hard-edged software
> criticism from the perspective of a very dissatisfied customer. This
> book is your chance to ingest the venom and bile of Bill Gates's evil
> twin."
> –Critical Art Ensemble
>
> ************
>
> Matthew Fuller is Reader in Media Design at Piet Zwart Institute,
> Rotterdam. As a member of the group I/O/D and collaborator with the
> group Mongrel, he participated in some of the key experiments in
> software that ground this book. He is the author of ATM (Shake
> Editions) and co-editor of README! ASCII CULTURE AND THE REVENGE OF
> KNOWLEDGE (Autonomedia).
>
> BEHIND THE BLIP is published by Autonomedia: http://www.autonomedia.org
>
> Paper, $14.95, 6"x9", 165 pages, ISBN 1-57027-139-9
> Information: http://www.autonomedia.org/behindtheblip
> Individual orders and course adoptions: Autonomedia, Phone/Fax (718)
> 963-2603
> email: [email protected]
> Regular mail orders: PO Box 568, Brooklyn, NY. 11211-0568
>
> –
> Dave Mandl
> [email protected]
> [email protected]
> http://www.wfmu.org/~davem
>
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