Why 128KB works

This is a reflection on what I have learned about the 128KB framework in the last two years, written on March 19th 2026.

Why 128KB is successful

• My first 128KB-workshop worked out fantastic. The feedback was great. The students resonated a lot with the concept.
• Works from the website will be soon displayed in various exhibitions
• I am making new, very interesting contacts
• I am getting design requests based on that concept

Why 128KB is fruitful

I realize that 128KB is much more things than just a website with nice gifs or a teaching framework. The idea of 128KB is a lever for a variety of things:

• It provides learners with helpful limits, so they don’t get lost
• It provides a sandbox or a virtual environment for the mindset of Permacomputing
  • Since it is nothing more than a mental model, learners can dive into it from any technical setup
• minimal computing, lowtech, permacomputing, demoscene…
  • It creates a unique cultural node for ideas circling around these topics
  • It brings all these topics to the table
• Limits
  • It creates awareness on the relationship between self-imposed and external limits
  • It teaches creativity within technical boundaries
• Tools
  • It raises questions about the tool-medium relationship
  • It encourages to explore the command line and simple tools
• Temporal Intelligence
  • It teaches about the past of computing
• It teaches the Magic Triangle
• It serves as a zoom into the high-resolution displays and shows what they actually consist of: Pixels

128KB beyond the Gif

Right now the framework circles around creating gif files that fit into the 128KB limit. But what if we change the parameter of the output? How much code, text, audio fits into 128KB?

The cocept of 128KB could be expanded to a much wider range of forms.

What 128KB could become

128KB could become quite a lot of things:

• an exhibition
• a magazine
• a conference
• a local community
• a school