  This paper uses the software program Linux and the discourse around it in
order to examine how software programs can be used to articulate and defend
social and economic positions. Although I do not use the term "expression" in a
strict legal sense, I claim that in order to make policy decisions involving
software, it is important to understand how the functionality of software is
expressive. Another way to state this is that software programs like Linux are
socially meaningful through functionality and talk about functionality.
  In section I, I review some recent legal scholarship about software and
explain why understanding how embedded technical expression works is important
given the increasingly large role of software in governance. In section II, I
explore software construction as a combination of social and technical
practices. In section III, I describe some examples of meaning-making around
the software program Linux. In section IV I conclude with a short description
of why such analyses are important.
