INVISIBLE WALLS: SOURCE CODE AS AN ARTISTIC AND ACTIVIST TOOL

by Camille Picard | Jan 19, 2026 | Cultural artefact

INVISIBLE WALLS: SOURCE CODE AS AN ARTISTIC AND ACTIVIST TOOL Collectif Iakeri Code and photo of the Invisible Walls sound and visual installation, 2022 [© Collectif Iakeri]. ABOUT CODE Murs Invisibles (Invisible Walls) is an immersive installation by the Iakeri...

CODING ANOTHER WORLD: RIVULET’S VISUAL LANGUAGE

by Camille Picard | Jan 19, 2026 | Cultural artefact

CODING ANOTHER WORLD: RIVULET’S VISUAL LANGUAGE Daniel Temkin, Snippet of Rivulet code, 2025 [CC BY 4.0]. A programming language is also an invitation for others to interpret and experiment. Rivulet briefly became popular on the Hacker News online forum, where users...

AN OBFUSCATED ODE TO HANDWRITTEN TEXT RECOGNITION

by Camille Picard | Jan 19, 2026 | Cultural artefact

AN OBFUSCATED ODE TO HANDWRITTEN TEXT RECOGNITION Adrian Cable, International Obfuscated C Code Contest, “Best of Show”, 2013 [CC BY-SA 4.0]. ABOUT CODE This C code is an example of obfuscated code, which is part of a long-lasting tradition that prizes programming...

PROGRAMMING IN CLASSICAL CHINESE

by Camille Picard | Jan 19, 2026 | Cultural artefact

PROGRAMMING IN CLASSICAL CHINESE Lingdong Huang et al., An Introduction to Programming in Wenyan, 2020 [CC BY-NC 4.0]. RELIC This yellowed code was designed to look as if it came from an ancient book. In reality, the work is less than a decade old – and likely exists...

:(){ :|:&};:

by Vincent Devillard | Jan 8, 2026 | Cultural artefact

:(){ :|:&};: Michał “lcamtuf” Zalewski & forgotten contributor, 1998. After including a similar “fork bomb” in his signature for a while, the computer security expert who first presented this code received an email suggestion to use “:” as a function name, so...