TOPLAP's core demand is screen transparency: the audience must see the code being written, not just hear its output

The founding principle of the live coding scene, articulated in the TOPLAP manifesto, is radical transparency: the performer’s screen must be projected. ‘Obscurantism is dangerous. Show us your screens.’ This is a political and aesthetic stance against the black box — against performers hiding their process behind pre-recorded tracks or opaque controllers. Showing the code means the audience can see the algorithm change in real time, making the performance’s mechanism visible. This doesn’t mean the audience must understand the code; a guitar audience needn’t know how to play guitar. But the process must be accessible, even if its appreciation requires specialist knowledge.

Examples

At an algorave, the performer’s editor (SuperCollider, TidalCycles, Hydra) is projected behind or alongside the audiovisual output. The code changes in real time as the set develops. The audience sees both the visual/audio result and the text being typed to produce it.

Assessment

Explain why projecting your code screen is not just a convention but a political position in live coding. Then describe what ‘obscurantism’ would look like in a live coding context (give two examples) and why TOPLAP considers it dangerous.