The computer programs for example which calculate the credit line of checking accounts or control medical instruments in an emergency station can’t be meaningfully called “media”.
algorithmic vs digitized
Contrary to conventional data like digitized images, sound and text documents,
the algorithmic instruction code allows a generative process.
It uses computers for computation,
not only as storage and transmission media.
And this precisely distinguishes program code from
non-algorithmic digital code,
describing for example the difference between algorithmic composition on the one hand and
audio CDs/mp3 files on the other,
between algorithmically generated text and
“hypertext’,
or between a graphical computer “demo” and
a video tape.
A piano score, even a 19th century one, is software when its instruction code can be executed by a human pianist as well as on a player piano.
~ software can be executed by humans, not only by computers
Literature is a conceptual art in that is not bound to objects and sites, but only to language.. Since formal language is a language, software can be seen and read as a literature.