Artists come in many different forms. Painters, photographers, weavers, ceramicists, writers, digital artists etc. One type of artist that isn’t usually thought of is the computer programmer. Without them, I wouldn’t be writing this post in my blog. I wouldn’t be able to create the fractal images I do on my computer. The Internet that you’re reading this on wouldn’t exist. The behind the scenes coders write the programs that enable us to do what we do on these magic little boxes.
Many of you are at the least, casual gamers. Programmers create the wonderful world that you spend those many hours in. The code is their art. Different than what many of us think of when we think of art, but art none the less.
One of my regular blog reads is Jason Kottke’s kottke.org site.
A post there yesterday brought me to a programmers site that I other wise would have never found because I am not a gamer and thus wouldn’t have any reason to check him out. The creator of this little game has a statement about the games meaning but playing the game prior to reading the programmers thoughts on it was, for me at least, much more poignant.
Jason Rohrer’s game Passage and more importantly, his story caused me to do something that I’ve never done before in all the years of Internet use. I placed a small donation into his PayPal account. I’ve been directly supporting authors of software programs for years by purchasing their programs, but this donation was the first time I’ve ever “connected” with the programmer.
You see, Jason doesn’t charge for his art, his program. He asks for small donations to help him support himself, his wife and daughter in their earth friendly lifestyle.
If you’d like to experience a different form of art than you may not have ever thought of before, check out Jason and his game, Passage.
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