Federica Frabetti - Software Theory

London New York

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Frabetti, Federica, 1966 author.

Software theory : a cultural and philosophical study / Federica Frabetti.

pages cm. (Media philosophy)

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-1-78348-196-5 (cloth : alk. paper)ISBN 978-1-78348-197-2 (pbk. : alk. paper)ISBN 978-1-78348-198-9 (electronic)

1. Software engineeringSocial aspects. 2. Software architectureSocial aspects. I. Title.

QA76.758.F725 2014

005.1dc23

2014033084

TM The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information Sciences Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992.

Printed in the United States of America

This book has been inspired by almost fifteen years of writing software as a software engineer for telecommunications. The people I wrote software with are too many to be named; nevertheless, I would like to thank them here because I learnt so much from them while also having so much fun.

The origins of this project lie with my time as a doctoral student at Goldsmiths, University of London, which provided an exciting and stimulating environment for the much more critical questioning of technology. First and foremost I am grateful to Joanna Zylinska for being an exceptional guide and a demanding interlocutor while I was at Goldsmiths, and for remaining a mentor and a friend long afterwards. Her work remains for me a model of intellectual and political engagement. I would also like to express my gratitude to all those who have read various parts of this book and immensely enriched it with their comments and critiques: David Boothroyd, Scott Dexter, Gary Hall, Janet Harbord, Sarah Kember, David Morley, and the late and much missed Mark Poster. I am especially grateful to Gary Hall for proposing Software Theory as the title of this book and for sharing with me some of his tremendous insights on technology (not least the one about quasi-functioning software).

Many years ago I had the privilege to discuss the early stages of my project with N. Katherine Hayles at a Masterclass organized by Rosi Braidotti at the University of Utrecht. Although over time my thought on technology has taken a different direction from Hayless, I maintain the greatest admiration for her work and feel fortunate to have remained in dialogue with her throughout the years. I am grateful to my colleagues and students at Oxford Brookes University for providing a lively environment for the discussion of my thoughts on philosophy and technology and for supporting the realization of this book through various research grants. I am also indebted to a number of other universities which have lent hospitality to my ideas, including Columbia University, New York; Brooklyn College, CUNY; Coventry University, and the University of Naples LOrientale (Italy). I am very grateful to the editors and reviewers at Rowman & Littlefield International for all their help and support with this project.

Parts of this book have been published as articles. An earlier version of Chapter 1, entitled Rethinking the Digital Humanities in the Context of Originary Technicity, acted as an opening to the special issue of Culture Machine, The Digital Humanities beyond Computing, vol. 12 (2011), which I edited. An early version of two sections of Chapter 3 and 4 appeared as part of another article, entitled Does It Work? The Unforeseeable Consequences of Quasi-Failing Technology, Culture Machine (Creative Media 11 [2009], http://www.culturemachine.net).