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Write a short post (150-300 words, about 1 to 2 paragraphs) addressing one or more of the questions posted below. The questions are written to help guide your thoughts, but you may choose to explore other aspects of one or both readings if there was something else that stood out to you. In the discussion for Tuesday’s class, we explored some of the ways that technological artifacts contain a political dimension, where the design of some technology might explicitly promote political views, or where the technology itself may be oriented in a way that requires certain political organization. Do you think the smartphone, as a whole, represents a more democratic or authoritarian technology (as defined in the Winner reading)? Or does it contain aspects of both? What are the strengths or drawbacks of the smartphone as an inherently democratic or authoritarian device? What changes would you make in this system, if you could? For the first reading on Wednesday, Nick Montfort and Ian Bogost discuss how the design of a hardware platform can both constrain and facilitate the types of content that can be produced or consumed on that platform. What are some ways that the design of the smartphone (or any other contemporary mobile media) facilitate the content that can possibly be produced/consumed with those devices? Think not only apps but photos, videos, music, games, etc. What are some ways in which certain uses might be hindered by the smartphone’s design? （the answer requires personal experience and examples.） Answer Examples: “After reading and discussing Langdon Winner’s piece on artifacts and politics, I understand how technical things have political qualities to them. There are aspects to this reading that I do agree with and some concepts that I am still uncertain about. He talked about the social determination of technology and how what matters is not the technology itself, but the social or economic system where it’s embedded in. He then dives into the “invention, design, or arrangement of a specific technical device or system, ” which I immediately thought of how smartphone companies are what they are because of their technical design.For people who buy Apple products such as the iPhone, they are also buying into a particular community. They are buying into the apps that come with the phone, its internal features, its face structure, etc. I think that this shows that the consumers are buying into an adaptation, a lifestyle and Apple requires its buyers to literally buy into their systems. This can be an example of political adaptation for technologies. People can decide to switch over systems, such as Androids or Google, but will also have to buy into their systems as well. ‘’ After it ， Write two or three sentences in response to this paragraph.When someone creates a computer artifact like a video game, a digital
artwork, or a work of electronic literature, what type of process is this?
Here’s one idea: it is a creative act that is similar in many ways to writing
a poem or taking a photograph, except that in this case, the creator doesn’t
use words one after another on paper or light bent through an aperture.
This type of inscription or exposure doesn’t happen—so what exactly does
happen?
The creator of a computer work might design circuits and solder
chips. Or, this author might write instructions for the integrated circuits
and microprocessors of a particular computer, or write software in a highlevel
programming language, or create 3D models to be added to a virtual
world, or edit digital video for embedding in a Web site.
The same question could be asked of the critic who interacts with such
a work. What does a creator, historian, researcher, student, or other user
do when experiencing a creative computer artifact? An encounter with
such a work could involve trying to understand the social and cultural
contexts in which it came to exist. It might also involve interpreting its
representational qualities—what it means and how it produces that
meaning. Alternatively, a study might involve looking at the methods of
this work’s construction, or the code itself, or even the hardware and
physical form of the machines on which it is used.
All of these levels of computational creativity are connected. Fortunately
for those of us who are interested in such uses of the computer,
there have already been many studies of digital media dealing with the
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reception and operation of computer programs, with their interfaces, and
with their forms and functions. But studies have seldom delved into the
code of these programs, and they have almost never investigated the platforms
that are the basis of creative computing.1 Serious and in-depth
consideration of circuits, chips, peripherals, and how they are integrated
and used is a largely unexplored territory for both critic and creator.
Platforms have been around for decades, though, right underneath
our video games, digital art, electronic literature, and other forms of
expressive computing. Digital media researchers are starting to see that
code is a way to learn more about how computers are used in culture, but
there have been few attempts to go even deeper, to investigate the basic
hardware and software systems upon which programming takes place, the
ones that are the foundation for computational expression. This book
begins to do this—to develop a critical approach to computational
platforms.
We hope this will be one of several considerations of this low level of
digital media, part of a family of approaches called “platform studies.”
Studies in this fi eld will, we hope, investigate the relationships between
platforms—the hardware and software design of standardized computing
systems—and infl uential creative works that have been produced on those
platforms.
Types of Platforms
The Atari Video Computer System (or VCS, a system also known by
its product number, 2600) is a well-defi ned example of a platform.
A platform in its purest form is an abstraction, a particular standard
or specifi cation before any particular implementation of it. To be used
by people and to take part in our culture directly, a platform must
take material form, as the Atari VCS certainly did. This can be done by
means of the chips, boards, peripherals, controllers, and other components
that make up the hardware of a physical computer system. The
platforms that are most clearly encapsulated are those that are sold as a
complete hardware system in a packaged form, ready to accept media such
as cartridges. The Atari VCS is a very simple, elegant, and infl uential
platform of this sort.
In other cases, a platform includes an operating system. It is often
useful to think of a programming language or environment on top of an
operating system as a platform, too. Whatever the programmer takes for
granted when developing, and whatever, from another side, the user is
required to have working in order to use particular software, is the plat1
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form. In general, platforms are layered—from hardware through operating
system and into other software layers—and they relate to modular
components, such as optional controllers and cards. Studies in computer
science and engineering have addressed the question of how platforms
are best developed and what is best encapsulated in the platform. Studies
in digital media have addressed the cultural relevance of particular software
that runs on platforms. But little work has been done on how the
hardware and software of platforms infl uences, facilitates, or constrains
particular forms of computational expression.
When digital media creators choose a platform, they simplify development
and delivery in many ways. For example, such authors need not
construct an entirely new computer system before starting on a particular
creative project. Likewise, users need not fashion or acquire completely
new pieces of hardware before interacting with such a work. That said,
work that is built for a platform is supported and constrained by what the
chosen platform can do. Sometimes the infl uence is obvious: a monochrome
platform can’t display color, for instance, and a videogame
console without a keyboard can’t accept typed input. But there are more
subtle ways that platforms infl uence creative production, due to the idioms
of programming that a language supports or due to transistor-level decisions
made in video and audio hardware. In addition to allowing certain
developments and precluding others, platforms also function in more
subtle ways to encourage and discourage different sorts of computer
expression. In drawing raster graphics, there is a considerable difference
between setting up one television scan line at a time as the Atari VCS
demands, having a buffered display with support for tiles and sprites, or
having some more elaborate system that includes a native 3D renderer.
Such a difference can end up being much more important than simple
statistics of screen resolution or color depth that are used as shorthand by
fans and marketers.
We offer here such a platform study, one that considers an infl uential
videogame system that helped introduce computing to a popular audience
and to the home. Our approach is mainly informed by the history of
material texts, programming, and computing systems. Other sorts of platform
studies may emphasize different technical or cultural aspects, and
may draw on different critical and theoretical approaches. To deal deeply
with platforms and digital media, however, any study of this sort must
be technically rigorous. The detailed analysis of hardware and code
connects to the experience of developers who created software for a platform
and users who interacted with and will interact with programs on
that platform. Only the serious investigation of computing systems as
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specifi c machines can reveal the relationships between these systems
and creativity, design, expression, and culture.
Although it was not the fi rst home videogame console, the Atari VCS
was the fi rst wildly popular one. It was affordable at the time, and it offered
the fl exibility of interchangeable cartridges. The popularity of the Atari
VCS—which was the dominant system for years and remained widely used
for more than a decade—supported the creation of nearly one thousand
games, many of which established techniques, mechanics, or entire
genres that continue to thrive today on much more technologically
advanced platforms. Although several companies fi elded consoles, by
1981 the Atari VCS accounted for 75 percent of home videogame system
sales.2 Indeed, the generic term for a videogame system in the early 1980s
was “an Atari.” Yet, despite its undisputed place in the annals of popular
culture, and despite having been the standard system for home video
gaming for so many years, Atari’s fi rst cartridge-based system is an
extremely curious computer.
Cost concerns led to a remarkable hardware design, which infl uenced
how software was written for the Atari VCS, which in turn infl uenced the
video games created during and after the system’s reign. Given that it used
a version of the very typical 6502 processor, which drove many computers
and consoles, one might not guess that the Atari VCS was so atypical. But
this processor interfaced with the display by means of a truly unique component,
the Television Interface Adaptor, or TIA. A television picture is
composed of many horizontal lines, illuminated by an electron beam that
traces each one by moving across and down a picture tube. Some programmers
worry about having each frame of the picture ready to be displayed
on time; VCS programmers must make sure that each individual
line of each frame is ready as the electron gun starts to light it up, “racing
the beam” as it travels down the screen.
The Roots of Video Gaming
In World of Warcraft, you start off, as a human, in Northshire Abbey. You
can move your character around using the W, A, S, and D keys, an interface
popularized by the fi rst-person shooter Quake. As you do this, the terrain
that you’re standing on moves off the screen and new terrain appears as
if from off screen. You are in a virtual space that is larger than the screen.
This shouldn’t be at all surprising. It seems that every 3D game, from
Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas and Super Mario 64 to Tomb Raider, offers
virtual spaces that are larger than the screen. Quake and other fi rst-person
shooters have them as well, as do 2D games. In the original Legend of Zelda,
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