When I reach out to the self-proclaimed “open source baddie” CC for an interview, I’m pretty sure she’s emailing me back from a pink mermaid purse.
“I’m just having so much fun,” she tells me about her seashell cyberdeck. “It’s a Tamagotchi. It’s also an e-reader. It’s networked to my vault and my servers, so it has access to all of my server data, which has all my PDFs, and books, and notes, and everything… It’s also connected to my local AI setup at home.”
CC has no background in software engineering or computer science, but she’s gotten good enough at building unconventional cyberdecks — small DIY computers — that she documents the process on her blog Bimbo Tech so that other women can follow her lead, even if they don’t yet know what RAM is.
The idea of the cyberdeck originated in William Gibson’s 1984 sci-fi novel “Neuromancer,” and when credit card-sized computers like the Raspberry Pi came on the market in the 2010s, hardware enthusiasts began building and sharing their own cyberdecks in niche online communities. But over the last few months, these communities have exploded in popularity thanks to women on social media who are teaching each other to build artistic, hyper-feminine computers by documenting their building processes.
“I have a running joke that there’s this underlying misogyny in tech — because whenever they release a pro model, or an elite model… I’m always like, let me guess, it’s black or silver,” CC said. “It’s never going to come in pink.”
The process of customizing and designing a cyberdeck has become an art form in itself. On Instagram and TikTok, you can find a cyberdeck made of wood and moss that runs Game Boy Color games; a desert-inspired MP3 player built inside a 3D-printed fossil; a Barbie dollhouse that opens up to reveal a functional mini-computer; or a duck figurine that can be used to record voice notes.
“I don’t want Meta AI glasses. I want to pirate books in a tiny embellished shell,” said the creator Sarahbelle Kim on TikTok. “No one can surveil you there. You can get some basic parts at the thrift store or eBay and just customize it.”
There’s obviously an aesthetic motivation to the rise of girly cyberdecks — why not use a Hello Kitty purse to check your email? It’s fun for the sake of fun. But the women building these over-the-top, bedazzled cyberdecks aren’t in it for the glitter alone. This trend is reaching its peak at a time when people feel powerless against the omnipresent homogeneity of big tech.
“I think that’s such a refreshing thing for people who were sold these devices that are like Apple’s… If you try to jailbreak it, if you try to do anything to this phone that you paid $1,000 for, that you own, it’s out of warranty,” CC said. “So I just love seeing people taking the power back into their hands, taking the control back into their hands, which obviously always means creativity when people are given the means to go outside of the black box.”
Maro Vardanyan doesn’t work with hardware as a blockchain developer, but she’s always enjoyed collecting and tinkering with old computer parts.
“A few months ago, I just started as a hobby making art and jewelry pieces and purses with recycled or upcycled old computers I had,” she said. “When I saw everyone doing cyberdecks, I was like, wait, why am I just doing recycled and upcycled ones when I can actually preserve the pieces on something that’s wearable, that’s movable?”
Vardanyan has taken a different approach to building cyberdecks, opting instead to emphasize the historic relationship between fiber art and technology. Vardanyan refers to her work as “crocheting with computers” or “macrame motherboards,” deliberately nodding to the role of weaving — a practice often viewed as domestic, women’s labor — in the history of early computing.
Before silicon processors, some early computers ran on magnetic-core memory, made up of copper wiring that was precisely threaded to encode the 1s and 0s of binary code. In order for NASA to build the Apollo Guidance Computer, for example, expert women textile workers were tasked with meticulously weaving wires in painstakingly complex patterns, which powered the spacecraft that landed the first man on the moon.
“The original processor was handwoven by seamstresses, not by engineers or anybody else,” she said. “I feel like the hand weaving, and even the fashion-meets-technology… It’s so full circle.”
Vardanyan started weaving pink Raspberry Pis to make purses and corsets, then posted photos of her works-in-progress on X.
“Of course, when the macrame went viral, all of the men are like, ‘This is such a waste of the Raspberry Pi,’ … or, ‘what about the rain?’” she said. “And then I have to be like, ‘Actually, it’s preserved in an acrylic shell.’ And then they’re like, ‘This is so performative, and the GPIO is gonna lose energy!’ And I’m like, ‘Actually, I’m using a conductive thread, so it actually will move and be fully functioning.’”
CC has also encountered condescending men on the internet who balk at the idea that someone would use a Raspberry Pi on something as frivolous as a seashell purse computer during a RAM shortage.
“This guy on Reddit was like, ‘You built your first computer a month ago, calm the f— down.’ Mind you, I’ve been building PCs for years,” CC said. “So, long story short, he ends up apologizing and buying me the circuit board for my next cyberdeck.”
From CC’s mermaid purse computer to Vardanyan’s Raspberry Pi corset, these cyberdecks are a direct rejection of Silicon Valley culture, and not just in their egregious embrace of the color pink. They’re impractical and inefficient on purpose, which seems sacrilegious in a culture so obsessed with optimization that unregulated Chinese peptide injections are trendy. It’s a radical act to opt for hacky, DIY tech experiences in order to forge a closer relationship with the devices that feel so abstract despite their ubiquity.
“Ten years ago, I would walk into a conference, there would be three girls, and people would literally just be like, ‘Were you hired for the marketing team?’” Vardanyan said. “I can’t even tell you how amazing it is seeing so many girls all over my social media and Instagram being into hardware, being into software, and then educating [each other], and that’s definitely the energy that we’re missing on every level in society.”
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