In my spare time, I ruin classic works of computer art by re-coding them in Entropy. This uses Entropy.js, Andrew Hoyer's library (both Entropy and Entropy.js are open-source, avail on github).

As the piece runs on, it becomes increasingly muddled, ending like most Entropy pieces, in random symbols. In this case, you can still make out the pattern. Since it's only four words, it is not hard to make out the sequence. You can see the full piece here.

! HANK
SHOT
MARY
! ! DEAD
! ! HANK !!
!! !!! HANK HANK
! ! ! GANK SGOT
! ! GANK MARY
GANK DEBD
SGOT
! SGOU HANK
! SGOT RGOT
! RGOT MARX
RGPT DDBD
LAQX !
!LAQW HANJ
! !LAQW RGPT
LBQW LBQW
! MBQW!CEBD
! DDBD !
! ! CEBD HBMJ
! ! CEAD RGPT
! ! CEAD LAQX!
! ! CEAC CEBC
! HAMJ ! !
! HBMJ ! GBMJ
! GBMJ ! RGOT
! GBNJ ! LAQX!
! GBMJ ! CEBC
! GBMJ GBMI !
! GBNI HBNJ HBNJ
! HBNJ HCNJ RGOS
! GCNJ GCNJ LAPW!
! GBNJ HBMJ CEBC

Just released a new version of Entropy to allow for a smoother, variable decay into nonsense.

For those not familiar with the project, Entropy is an esolang: a programming language as immersive art piece. It is best experienced by a programmer working alone from home -- like other programming languages of this type, the experience is in the struggle to use it. Entropy is about the compulsiveness of programming, the rigidity of logic, the way we must compromise with the computer in order to get it to understand us. It complicates this by removing any illusion of perfection -- it's a language where getting things right is actively prohibited.

For the non-programmers, you can get a taste of the language by interacting with Drunk Eliza, the classic Eliza chatbot written in Entropy.

Version 1.1.1 smooths out the rate of decay and allows the programmer to adjust its speed.

My conversation with her today:

Hey, Chicago people! I'll be in town this Thursday on for gli.tc/h.There's tons of great work at this festival, they got a lot of the best Glitch artists to come out. Should be amazing!

You can see five peices from my Sector series at Roxaboxen. And I'll be speaking Sunday morning (Oct 3rd) at School of the Art Institute of Chicago about Sector, Yeep!, and Entropy.

Here's an example of using Entropy objects in other .Net languages. This is a way to allow only some elements of the program to decay, something that might be necessary to embed an Entropy program in a Silverlight application or webform. As an experiment, I wrote a version of the classic therapist program, Eliza, in C#, but holding her responses (along with the logic that determines which response to give) in Entropy objects.

Eliza starts off sounding about right, although slurring her words a bit:

eliza > HI! I'M ELIZA. WHAT'S YOUR UROBLEM?

As time goes on, she gets harder to understand, and a bit confrontational:

me > what's your deal?

eliza > WHY ARE YOU DONCESNED @BOUT"OY DDAL?

This is apparently her "angry drunk" phase.

After I tell I don't understand for the third time, she gives up, collapsing into complete incomprehensibility (and perhaps a pool of vomit):

eliza > MLE9TF CON(T?PEPDAT YOURTIBH?

(should be "PLEASE DON'T REPEAT YOURSELF!")