Dezeen Magazine

Movie: Newton Virus by Troika

Newton Virus by Troika from Dezeen on Vimeo.

Newton Virus is a computer virus designed by London collective Troika, that causes icons on your computer desktop to fall towards the ground as if affected by gravity.

The non-destructive virus is transferred to a colleague's Mac via a specially designed USB device (above).

Newton Virus, created in 2005, is on show at the Design and the Elastic Mind exhibition at MoMA in New York until May 12. The movie shown here has not been seen before.

Here's some info from Troika:

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NEWTON VIRUS

In the beginning were harmless computer viruses. Viruses born out of the wit of early computer adopters, viruses whose sole purpose was to surprise and amuse. A non-destructive form of artificial life.

We wanted to revive this golden era, and went on to create our first computer virus. We chose to do it for mac as the platform is still a virgin territory ;-)

Spice up your colleagues' day with our Newton Virus, the first virus to introduce gravity to your laptop, causing the desktop icons to fall down as if subject to the gravitational pull from the real world.

Newton Virus comes on a USB key for manual infection. Simply plug the key into a computer and the virus will automatically copy itself on the hard drive.

The virus will then hit at random, but only once. It will not replicate itself, mail itself to your friends or destroy any of your files, but instead provides you with moments of blissful surprise and magic.