I recently answered a series of interesting questions about ppg256, questions that pertained to digital preservation among other issues.
I just wanted to share the one that I thought about the longest. Although I care deeply about properly addressing issues of energy use, recycling, and ethical sourcing of computer components, I think that there are some problems with putting a great deal of weight on these when one is specifically in digital art and digital poetry contexts. I was asked:
> What effect does the environment, both location and ecology, have on the
> work? Does it have long term implications such as power usage, recycling,
> etc? Are those addressed in the work itself?
And I replied:
> Centrally, my project is to show that computer programs can be poetic. The
> ppg256 programs can be run on any computer; they do not require a museum,
> gallery, proprietary operating system or Apple Store. So, practically anyone
> with access to computing can run them at any location. The development and
> running of computational poetry, to be honest, is not killing our
> environment. The mindset that computers are for business, war, and science
> but cannot be used to make poems and art does risk — to be honest —
> killing our future.
Well put, and this is the argument I have with people who dismiss (with prejudice) this and related movements (art scenes, demoscene, tracking scenes, etc.)
Roger Ebert held the same belief regarding electronic games. When pressured with nearly pure examples of computer games that can only be classified as art, such as Flower, he invoked the One True Scotsman fallacy and claimed that, if a game becomes that artistic, it is no longer a game.