'God.js' lets you program and enforce your own browser-based religion

[cbayer]

http://www.theverge.com/2013/3/6/4070742/god-js-lets-you-program-and-enforce-your-own-browser-based-religion

'Thou shalt not browse 4chan'

By Joshua Kopstein on March 6, 2013 01:37 pm



Piety is hard to come by in the anything-goes swamp of sin that is the internet. But thanks to a group of computer artists, true believers can now find divine purity right where they need it most: running inside their web browser.

Built in 48 hours during Art Hack Day's "God Mode" hackathon at 319 Scholes in Brooklyn, God.js is a Chrome plugin and scripting language that enforces religious edicts as you browse the web. Think of it as your very own computational Ten Commandments — an executable holy scripture that rewards and punishes actions based on the defined parameters of your chosen faith. But despite being in the style of traditionally immutable sacred texts, God.js is a functional language thats lets anyone code their own beliefs, making it like an open source platform for browser-based religion.

The hackathon takes its name from the invincibility mod frequently found in computer games of the 1990s, expanding it into a larger exploration of the various god-like abilities technology now offers. Programmer Ivan Safrin worked on the God.js project along with Art Fag City Editor-in-Chief Will Brand and Eyebeam resident computer scientist Ramsey Nasser. "For me personally, this idea drew a lot of parallels to my own thoughts around the ‘God Mode’ theme, which involved end-user terms of service agreements as religious commandments," he explains in an email. His other project for the hackathon is "Terms of Mt. Sinai," an audio installation which recites Facebook's TOS inside the bathroom at 319 Scholes. Other projects explore similar ideas, like “Pantheon,” another Chrome plugin that allows everyone else using it to momentarily see which sites you’re browsing, and “Pious Web,” which covers any questionable Google image search results with pictures of Jesus.

Religious web-filtering and monitoring isn't new, of course. With church websites and hardcore pornography always just a few clicks apart, devout families and institutions have long relied on a sketchy selection of services to try and keep their web experience sacred — often futilely. One of the oldest examples, the Christian FamilyFellowship.com, has been around since 1999 as a dial-up internet provider, now boasting 67 filters for "pornography, gambling, profanity, social networking, intimate apparel, and more." Its Jewish equivalent, Guard Your Eyes, also offers a support network for internet addicts on top of its Rabbi-monitored religious censorship tool.

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