Programmed Visions: Software and Memory

Chun examines the paradox at the heart of software: it promises permanence through storage yet operates through constant execution, repetition, and decay. She argues that the ideology of software — the belief that code is inherently reliable, logical, and transparent — obscures how it actually functions as a technology of memory that is always degrading, always requiring regeneration. The book connects the history of programming to broader histories of eugenics, race, and governance, tracing how the concept of "programmability" migrated from genetics to computing. Chun's reading of source code as a fetish object — visible yet not what actually runs on the machine — challenges the common assumption that open source equals transparency. Dense and theoretically demanding, it rewards readers willing to sit with its discomfort about what it means to delegate memory and decision-making to machines.