Is this a post?

As Kittler’s “There is No Software” still continues to confuse after multiple reads, I’ve decided to lay out the framework of what I believe he seems to be saying before I tackle my own questions and opinions.

Kittler says that through a “system of secrecy”, “perfect graphic user interfaces, since they dispense with writing itself, hide a whole machine from its users. Secondly, on the microscopic level of hardware itself, so-called protection software has been implemented in order to prevent "untrusted programs" or "untrusted users" from any access to the operating system's kernel and input/output channels”. If I am reading Kittler’s non-writing to any semblance of correctness, this premise that everything and its processes are hidden and obscure results with the operator having no understanding of what is actually going on as he types into his computer. This ignorance results in the operator losing ownership over what he has written- in fact there is nothing to own at all, as the operator cannot touch nor understand the computer memory’s transistor cells, “written texts- including this text- do not exist anymore”. In addition, Kittler seems to be saying that we must emphasize hardware- the corporeal, the electronic signals, the mechanical- over software as out ignorance over the relationship between software and hardware leaves us dangerously vulnerable to those few (and those corporations) who do understand.

There are a couple of things that I feel inclined to disagree with here. Firstly, “There is No Software” seems to me like another death of the author article which is not new in terms of postmodern literary criticism. However, after spending some time with the line “we do not write anymore” and “written texts- including this text- do not exist anymore”, Kittler goes beyond just the death of the author, he is claiming the death of literature and the actual process of writing itself. Does new media theory render literature obsolete? Does the obscurity of the internal processes of computers and their hidden programming cause operators in turn to become obsolete and ignorant? Do we really have no authorship over the activities of our computers?

If we believe Kittler’s statement that because we don’t understand how our computer works, because software is veiled in layers and layers of protected secrecy, then we don’t own or understand our work, then how about the fact that I have no idea how electronic signals work in my own brain to form these thoughts and how they are then coded into further signals that trigger muscles I am unaware of: do I not then own my own thoughts and muscle movements?

In all, I think “There is No Software” is more sensational than productive. Kittler makes grandiose statements that are ringed with condescension and expectancy, as if we should already know what he is saying.