<nettime> New from Autonomedia: BEHIND THE BLIP, by Matthew Fuller

[David Mandl <dmandl@panix.com>]

New from Autonomedia...

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: orders@autonomedia.org
Regular mail orders: PO Box 568, Brooklyn, NY. 11211-0568

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