Embroidery and Open Source Software
| May 22, 2008
Just last night, Nili was looking for quilting patters and suggested that there should be a supply of patterns under Creative Commons licences. Today, Boing Boing has this post on “Open Source Embroidery and the ‘gendered gift economy’”, covering an interview by Whitney Trettien with Ele Carpenter who runs the “Open Source Embroidery Project”. Comparing open source software and embroidery, she writes:
Embroidery is constructed (mostly by women) in hundreds of tiny stitches which are visible on the front of the fabric. The system of the stitches is revealed on the back of the material. Some embrioderers seal the back of the fabric, preventing others from seeing the underlying structure of the pattern. Others leave the back open for those who want to take a peek. A few integrate the backend process into the front of the fabric. The patterns are shared amongst friends in knitting and embroidery ‘ciricles’ [sic.].
Software is constructed (mostly by men) in hundreds of tiny pieces of code, which form the hidden structure of the programme or interface. Open Source software allows you to look at the back of the fabric, and understand the structure of your software, modify it and distribute it. The code is shared amongst friends through online networks. However the stitches or code only make sense to those who are familiar with the language or patterns.
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