Found in the Machine

Daina Bouquin

Every line of code has a story. Most of us just never hear it.  Found in the Machine is a narrative podcast about the forgotten people, decisions, and accidents that quietly shaped the digital world.  If you've ever wondered who actually made the technology you use every day, and why you've never heard their name before, you'll feel at home here. This show is for the curious, not the credentialed. You don't need a technical background to follow along. You just need to be the kind of person who pulls on threads.  New episodes unearth human stories from computing history every other week. 

  1. 3 hr ago ·  Bonus

    Humans of Mortal Kombat

    Found in the Margins is a series of mini bonus episodes that will be available to Patreon members every other week alternating with the main show. This first episode is being shared here for all Found in the Machine listeners.  Join the Patreon if you'd like to continue hearing these bonus stories.  This episode explores the creation of Mortal Kombat, the strange reality of early video game digitization, and the landmark 1990s lawsuit that decided who legally owns a human body once it becomes pixels.  Episode Music James Opie / Nihilore, CC BY 4.0TricksFailures of InfinityTechno Syndrome (Mortal Kombat) by The Immortals via Luminous Ambition Additional Reading Pesina v. Midway Mfg. Co., 948 F. Supp. 40 (N.D. Ill. 1996). https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/FSupp/948/40/2098879/Strata. (1994, July). [Advertisement for the arcade game BloodStorm]. EGM 2. Retrieved from https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Daniel-Pesina-who-starred-as-Johnny-Cage-in-Mortal-Kombat-has-switched-to_fig11_357487546C-SPAN. (2013, November 27). 1993 Senate committee hearings on video game violence [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lhwM3ZMTCR0Support the show 💚 This show is independently produced. You can support the show by joining the show's Patreon. Patreon members get additional content and help make the show possible. You can also donate via Buy Me a Coffee. If you enjoyed this episode, please consider leaving a rating and review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. And don't forget to sign up to receive Notes from the Machine with each episode.

    Humans of Mortal Kombat

  2. 3 hr ago

    Cry Wolf: Camera Traps, Waiting, and Seeing

    Since the 1890s, we've been building machines that wait in our place, in the dark, for something to move. This is the story of how a thread across a trail became a sensor that can feel heat, and what we learn when we really look.  In this Episode George Shiras: the Michigan naturalist and early wildlife photographer who rigged the first trip-wire camera traps in the 1890sPyroelectricity: the physical property that lets a crystal generate a faint electrical charge when its temperature changesThe Fresnel lens: how a design borrowed from 19th-century lighthouses now focuses invisible infrared light onto motion sensors in camera traps, driveway floodlights, and burglar alarmsThe Haíɫzaqv Nation's coastal wolfs: How a camera trap on the coast caught a wolf doing something scientists didn't know wild wolves were capable ofMachine learning classifiers: how citizen scientists trains algorithms to sort real animal sightings from the false alarms Colorado's gray wolf reintroduction: the closely monitored 2023 reintroduction effort and recent events  Episode Music James Opie / Nihilore, CC BY 4.0Hands Clasped at the End of the WorldThe Murky DeepYou Saw the Signs But Never Acknowledged Them Additional Reading Cecco, L. (2025, November 20). Raiders of the lobster pot: Wily wolves learn to haul in Canadian crab traps. The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/nov/20/canadia-british-coumbia-sea-wolves-learn-to-loot-crab-traps-for-bait Davenport, J. (2025, August 31). Wolf encounters & insights: 2025 newsletter. Churchill Wild. https://churchillwild.com/wolf-encounters-insights-2025-newsletter-by-jad-davenport/ Keller, H. J. (2000, May 11). 30 years of passive infrared motion detectors: A technology review [Paper presentation]. OPTO/IRS2, Erfurt, Germany. https://jvs.de/Carclo_Fresnel/pdf_content/2000-05_irs2paper_Hans_j_Keller.pdf Longwell, A. (2025, July 17). WATCH: Colorado Parks and Wildlife shares first footage of state's newest wolf pups. Vail Daily.  https://www.vaildaily.com/news/colorado-wolf-pup-video-routt-county/ Ross, T. (2026, August 10). Colorado hunter thought wolf shot and killed in January was a coyote. The Colorado Sun. https://coloradosun.com/2026/08/10/colorado-hunter-kills-wolf-thinking-it-coyote/ Shiras, G., III. (1906, July). Photographing wild game with flashlight and camera. The National Geographic Magazine, 17(7), 367–423. Shiras, G., III. (1908, June). One season's game-bag with the camera. The National Geographic Magazine, 19(6). Shiras, G., III. (1935). Hunting wild life with camera and flashlight: A record of sixty-five years' visits to the woods and waters of North America (Vols. 1–2). National Geographic Society. https://archive.org/details/HuntingWildLifeWithCameraAndFlashlight.Volume121935Copy Slade, R. (2026, June 4). The outdoorsman who made wildlife photography a big deal for National Geographic. National Geographic. https://www.nationalgeographic.com/history/article/george-shiras-iii-wildlife-photography Support the show 💚 This show is independently produced. You can support the show by joining the show's Patreon. Patreon members get additional content and help make the show possible. You can also donate via Buy Me a Coffee. If you enjoyed this episode, please consider leaving a rating and review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. And don't forget to sign up to receive Notes from the Machine with each episode.

  3. 4 Aug

    Tidal Forces: Calculating D-Day

    In 1944 the Allies needed to know exactly what the water would do on a coast called "Position Z." So a deaf mathematician and six young women in a basement near Liverpool calculated the future.   In this episode Arthur Doodson: the deaf mathematician at the Liverpool Tidal Institute, the world's leading authority on tides, who guessed he was predicting a Normandy landing and said nothingSix women working as Computers: hired for their diligence, skill with numbers, and neat handwriting, they ran the harmonic analysis and operated the tide-predicting machinesThe tide predicting machines: the Bidston Kelvin machine and the Roberts Légé machine, analogue computers made of brass, gears, and pulleys.D-Day: The largest seaborne invasion in history Episode Music James Opie / Nihilore, CC BY 4.0House of Skies pt2Are You HappyBurnt FieldsToska Archival Audio / Sounds BBCPrimary History KS2: WW2 Clips. An air-raid in progress Additional Notes For the group photo of the women who calculated the tides after the war, and for what didn’t make it into this episode, visit notes.foundinthemachine.com. Special thank you to Angelina at the Bidston Observatory who responded to my inquiries as I looked for the Computers' names. Bidston Observatory has been converted into an artistic research centre and more information about it can be found here.   Additional Reading Bidston Lighthouse. (2017, March 8). Women in the workplace. http://www.bidstonlighthouse.org.uk/women-in-the-workplace/ Carlsson-Hyslop, A. E. (2010). An anatomy of storm surge science at Liverpool Tidal Institute 1919-1959: Forecasting, practices of calculation and patronage [Doctoral dissertation, University of Manchester]. NERC Open Research Archive. https://nora.nerc.ac.uk/id/eprint/14623/ Friends of Bidston Hill. (n.d.). Bidston Observatory. http://www.bidstonhill.org.uk/heritage/trail08/ Parker, B. B. (2011). The tide predictions for D-Day. Physics Today, 64(9), 35-40. https://doi.org/10.1063/PT.3.1257 Scoffield, J. (2016, November 9). My early life at Bidston Observatory. Bidston Observatory in Retrospect. http://www.bidstonobservatory.org.uk/early-life/ Woodworth, P. L. (2020). Tide prediction machines at the Liverpool Tidal Institute. History of Geo- and Space Sciences, 11(1), 15-29. https://doi.org/10.5194/hgss-11-15-2020 Woodworth, P. L. (2015, December). Bidston Observatory and its tide prediction machines. Bidston Observatory in Retrospect. http://www.bidstonobservatory.org.uk/tide-prediction-machines/ Support the show 💚 This show is independently produced. You can support the show by joining the show's Patreon. Patreon members get additional content and help make the show possible. You can also donate via Buy Me a Coffee. If you enjoyed this episode, please consider leaving a rating and review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. And don't forget to sign up to receive Notes from the Machine with each episode.

  4. 21 Jul

    Entropy Hunters: Random Numbers and Chaos Machines

    This is the story of how we learned to fake the most natural thing in the world. What it cost us. And the strange places we still go, even now, to steal a little of the real thing back.  In this Episode Bernice Brown: the RAND statistician whose job was to hunt for a pattern inside a million digits and sign her name only when she could not find oneThe electronic roulette wheel: RAND's random number making machine and why its raw output drifted into biasStanisław Ulam: the mathematician whose card game in a hospital bed became the Monte Carlo method, and the reason anyone needed randomness by the millions in the first placeJohn von Neumann: the middle square method, and the resulting "state of sin" Episode Music James Opie / Nihilore, CC BY 4.0 Warmth Sounds Computer History Museum Sounds of the 1960s: The IBM 1410  CuriousMarc 1964 IBM 029 keypunch card punching demonstration  Additional Reading  Brown, B. (1948). Some tests of the randomness of a million digits (Paper No. P-44). RAND Corporation. https://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/papers/2008/P44.pdf Iowa State College Statistical Laboratory. (1935). Annual report of the statistical laboratory: July 1, 1933 to June 30, 1934. Iowa State College. https://isuu00001library102stg.blob.core.windows.net/digital-objects/statsannualreports/pdf/statsannualreports3414.pdf Markoff, J. (1995, September 19). Security flaw is discovered in software used in shopping. The New York Times, p. A1. https://archive.ph/Hz0pX Mercator, V. (2023, October 1). The middle squares method: The first PRNG. VM's Numbers Station. https://vm70.neocities.org/posts/2023-10-01-middle-squares/ RAND Corporation. (2001). A million random digits with 100,000 normal deviates (MR-1418-RC). https://www.rand.org/pubs/monograph_reports/MR1418.html Summerscales, O. (2023, November 1). Hitting the jackpot: The birth of the Monte Carlo method. Actinide Research Quarterly. https://www.lanl.gov/media/publications/actinide-research-quarterly/1123-hitting-the-jackpot-the-birth-of-the-monte-carlo-method  Support the show 💚 This show is independently produced. You can support the show by joining the show's Patreon. Patreon members get additional content and help make the show possible. You can also donate via Buy Me a Coffee. If you enjoyed this episode, please consider leaving a rating and review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. And don't forget to sign up to receive Notes from the Machine with each episode.

  5. 7 Jul

    Half-Light: Mark Klein and Room 641A

    A brutalist fortress in San Francisco serves as a vital artery for the American internet. In 2003, AT&T technician Mark Klein started noticing strange things on the sixth floor of that building. Strange things about Room 641A. This is a story about the infrastructure we look past, government mass surveillance, and why the machine Mark discovered never actually turned off. In this Episode Mark Klein: An AT&T technician and NSA whistleblower whose sworn declaration exposed the US government's warrantless domestic surveillance programFiber Tapping: The simple physics behind fiber optic splitting and how it's used to duplicate internet traffic without leaving a traceHepting v. AT&T: The class action lawsuit built on Klein's evidence, and how retroactive immunity dismantled it Episode Music James Opie / Nihilore, CC BY 4.0Hopeless LithromanticOur Time is ShortThrone of the SoulGirl in the MoonArchival Audio FRONTLINE. (2008, May 19). Room 641a [Video]. PBS. https://www.pbs.org/video/frontline-room-641a/Bush, G.W. (2005, December 17). President's radio address [Video]. The White House. https://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/news/releases/2005/12/20051217.html Additional Reading Cohn, C. (2026, April 30). The whistleblower who uncovered the NSA's "big brother machine." The MIT Press Reader. https://thereader.mitpress.mit.edu/the-whistleblower-who-uncovered-the-nsas-big-brother-machine/ Electronic Frontier Foundation. (2014, August 9). How the NSA's domestic spying program works. https://www.eff.org/nsa-spying/how-it-works FISA Amendments Act of 2008: Congress grants telecommunications companies retroactive immunity from civil suits for complying with NSA terrorist surveillance program. (2009). Harvard Law Review, 122(4), 1271–1278. https://harvardlawreview.org/print/vol-122/congress-grants-telecommunications-companies-retroactive-immunity-from-civil-suits-for-complying-with-nsa-terrorist-surveillance-program-ae-fisa-amendments-act-of-2008-pub-l-no-110-261/ Harris, B. (2025, June 12). What is inside Room 641A. Covert Access Team. https://covertaccessteam.substack.com/p/what-is-inside-room-641a Klein, M. (2007). Public unredacted Klein declaration [Legal declaration]. Electronic Frontier Foundation. https://www.eff.org/document/public-unredacted-klein-declaration Klein, M. (2009). Wiring up the big brother machine... and fighting it. BookSurge Publishing. (Bookshop.org affiliate link) Marcus, J. S. (2006). Declaration of J. Scott Marcus in support of plaintiffs' motion for preliminary injunction [Court filing]. Hepting v. AT&T Corp., No. C-06-0672-JCS (N.D. Cal.). Electronic Frontier Foundation. http://www.eff.org/legal/cases/att/SER_marcus_decl.pdf McDaniel, E. (2026, June 12). A key U.S. spy tool has lapsed — now what? NPR. https://www.npr.org/2026/06/12/nx-s1-5856291/fisa-702-surveillance-expiration-bill-pulte New, W. (2003, September 25). Congress funds Defense, kills Terrorism Information Awareness. Government Executive. https://www.govexec.com/defense/2003/09/congress-funds-defense-kills-terrorism-information-awareness/15051/ Support the show 💚 This show is independently produced. You can support the show by joining the show's Patreon. Patreon members get additional content and help make the show possible. You can also donate via Buy Me a Coffee. If you enjoyed this episode, please consider leaving a rating and review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. And don't forget to sign up to receive Notes from the Machine with each episode.

  6. 23 Jun

    Silent Agreement: MIDI and What We Hear in the Wires

    Sheet music has always been an invisible treaty. A shared language that belongs to everyone and no one. But fifty years ago, as musicians began shaping sound out of raw electricity, that treaty fell apart. In this episode The Broken Treaty: Why early synthesizers from different manufacturers couldn't talk to each other, and the resulting landscape of incompatible voltages.The Unlikely Alliance: How Dave Smith in the US (Sequential Circuits) and Ikutaro Kakehashi in Japan (Roland) looked past corporate rivalry to build a universal standard.The Birth of MIDI: How microscopic 1981 microprocessors forced engineers to shrink the musical universe into elegant, lightweight digital sentences.Juan Atkins: the Detroit musician whose work sparked the global rise of techno music. Episode Music Johann Sebastian BachPrelude No. 1 in C majorJames Opie / Nihilore, CC BY 4.0Bright Lights of Summer Our Ships Line the Ocean FloorDisconnectedAlfonseKorg MS 10Donghyuk HeoJohann Sebastian Bach, Prelude No. 1 in C major, BWV 846, on Modular SynthesizerAdditional Reading Billias, A. (2024, December 21). MIDI history chapter 6: MIDI begins 1981-1983. The MIDI Association. https://midi.org/midi-history-chapter-6-midi-begins-1981-1983 Doyle, T. (2024, November). Classic tracks: Model 500 'No UFOs'. Sound on Sound. https://www.soundonsound.com/techniques/classic-tracks-model-500-no-ufos Stewart, D. (2014, December 3). Technical Grammy Award: Ikutaro Kakehashi and Dave Smith. Recording Academy. https://www.grammy.com/news/technical-grammy-award-ikutaro-kakehashi-and-dave-smith/ MIDI Manufacturers Association. (1996, February). MIDI 1.0 detailed specification (Version 4.2.1). https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ewRrvMEFRPlKon6nfSCxqnTMEu70sz0c/view Support the show 💚 This show is independently produced. You can support the show by joining the show's Patreon. Patreon members get additional content and help make the show possible. You can also donate via Buy Me a Coffee. If you enjoyed this episode, please consider leaving a rating and review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. And don't forget to sign up to receive Notes from the Machine with each episode.

  7. 9 Jun

    Working in the Dark: Secrets, Silicon, and Light

    In 1916, a tired chemist in a Berlin laboratory accidentally dipped his fountain pen into a pool of molten tin and pulled out the foundation of the digital world. He had no idea what he had done.  In this episode Jan Czochralski: The Polish chemist whose mistake became the method used to grow nearly every silicon crystal wafer on Earth. The occupation of Poland: The violent suppression of the Polish people by the Nazis and the Soviet Union (and what Jan Czochralski did during that time).Industrial alchemy: The complex, global journey required to turn stones into the microchips inside our devices.Extreme Ultraviolet Light lithography: The staggeringly precise process we use to paint microscopic circuits onto silicon canvases.Episode Music James Opie / Nihilore, CC BY 4.0LiberosisSaved by a Simple Little ThingAtomic Fire LightCathedralThis is EnoughArchival Audio Imperial War Museums, Non-Commercial LicenseFirst World War Battle Sounds, Sound: © IWM (21819)Additional Reading ASML. (2026). EUV lithography systems. https://www.asml.com/en/products/euv-lithography-systems Branch Education. (2025, August 30). The $200M machine that prints microchips: The EUV photolithography system [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B2482h_TNwg Copley, M. (2024, September 30). A tiny town just got slammed by Helene. It could massively disrupt the tech industry. NPR. https://www.npr.org/2024/09/30/nx-s1-5133462/hurricane-helene-quartz-microchips-solar-panels-spruce-pine Institute of National Remembrance. (2026). Jan Czochralski. Giants of Science. https://gigancinauki.pl/ge/biographies/8248,Jan-Czochralski.html Kępa, M. (2017, August). Nazi collaborator or resistance fighter? The extraordinary story behind the man at the core of the digital revolution. Culture.pl. https://culture.pl/en/article/nazi-collaborator-or-resistance-fighter-the-extraordinary-story-behind-the-man-at-the-core-of-the PV Education. (2024). Refining silicon. https://www.pveducation.org/pvcdrom/manufacturing-si-cells/refining-silicon Sokolowski, G. (2023, July 17). Polish chemist creates the foundation for the semiconductor industry. PASI EDU. https://pasi-edu.org/polish-chemist-creates-the-foundation-for-the-semiconductor-industry/ Support the show 💚 This show is independently produced. You can support the show by joining the show's Patreon. Patreon members get additional content and help make the show possible. You can also donate via Buy Me a Coffee. If you enjoyed this episode, please consider leaving a rating and review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. And don't forget to sign up to receive Notes from the Machine with each episode.

  8. 26 May

    America on Hold: How the Internet Arrived

    She was a copywriter turned marketer who watched focus groups attempt to use computers. She knew the internet wasn't a product you could sell. You needed to give people a way in. Her name was Jan Brandt, and she decided to mail it to them. In this episode Jan Brandt: The architect of America Online's carpet bombing strategy that put a billion discs in American handsOmaha Steaks, airlines, and grocery stores: how the discs became inescapableA 150-pound throne and a museum case: What happened to the AOL discs that didn't go in the trashThe digital divide: The people who got left behindEpisode Music James Opie / Nihilore, CC BY 4.0There's Garbage in the Mariana TrenchMorality CentreHemiteleiaWhere There is No DarknessAdditional Reading McCullough, B. (2014, August). She gave the world a billion AOL CDs: An interview with marketing legend Jan Brandt [Podcast episode]. Internet History Podcast. https://www.internethistorypodcast.com/2014/08/she-gave-the-world-a-billion-aol-cds-an-interview-with-marketing-legend-jan-brandt/ National Telecommunications and Information Administration. (n.d.). Data Central. U.S. Department of Commerce. https://www.ntia.gov/topics/data-central Ramo, J. C. (1997, September 22). How AOL lost the battles but won the war. Time. https://time.com/archive/6731455/how-aol-lost-the-battles-but-won-the-war/ Smithsonian Institution. (n.d.). America Online (AOL) disc [Object record, NMAH catalog no. 2010.3015.05]. National Museum of American History. https://www.si.edu/object/nmah_1395721  Support the show 💚 This show is independently produced. You can support the show by joining the show's Patreon. Patreon members get additional content and help make the show possible. You can also donate via Buy Me a Coffee. If you enjoyed this episode, please consider leaving a rating and review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. And don't forget to sign up to receive Notes from the Machine with each episode.

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About

Every line of code has a story. Most of us just never hear it.  Found in the Machine is a narrative podcast about the forgotten people, decisions, and accidents that quietly shaped the digital world.  If you've ever wondered who actually made the technology you use every day, and why you've never heard their name before, you'll feel at home here. This show is for the curious, not the credentialed. You don't need a technical background to follow along. You just need to be the kind of person who pulls on threads.  New episodes unearth human stories from computing history every other week. 

Information

  • Creator
    Daina Bouquin
  • Years Active
    2026
  • Episodes
    19
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © 2026 Daina Bouquin
  • Show Website
    Found in the Machine

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