But what about the people who care passionately about opening up the scientific process, but who have little access to labs and lack formal scientific educations? For them there is always the way of the biopunk.

The term "biopunk" -- an offshoot of "cyberpunk" -- originally described a genre of science fiction dealing with biotechnological themes. But as computer and Internet culture took off, the term came also to be associated with the "information-wants-to-be-free" hacker ethos.

Biopunk shares with cyberpunk a spirit of social critique in the sciences, and a commitment to limiting corporate control of data. Like cyberpunk, it's also a movement that encompasses the work of engineers, scientists, artists and cultural critics. But the biopunk revolution has yet to be codified or legitimized -- it's as ill-defined as the genome itself. While cyberpunk is the familiar stuff of Wired cover stories and desktop computers, biopunk lurks at the corners of bioinformatics conferences and in the late-night lab work of anti-authoritarian university researchers who contribute to open-source software projects on the sly. Cyberpunk finds expression in big-budget Hollywood pictures like "The Matrix"; biopunk animates the bizarre art of people like San Francisco biopunk artist Dale Hoyt, whose cult video "Transgenic Hairshirt" has been passed from hand to hand in the San Francisco art underground.

Biopunk also differs from cyberpunk in that it is associated with the life sciences and medicine, two areas of inquiry that have a long history of ethical debate over the relationship between research and the public good. Biopunks can therefore call on a venerable tradition of philosophical thought when they raise objections to how scientists are gathering and using genomic data. Moreover, biopunks often protest misuses of the human body and its reproductive functions, which makes biopunk a considerably more feminist and queer movement than straight-guy cyberpunk ever was.

But what do biopunks want? It depends on who you ask. Dale Hoyt says it's all about protesting both "bio-Luddites and apologists for the biotech industry." He adds that it's also about questioning current science. "I think the human genome project is a capitalist fable, a fable in which the government works with private industry. The genome race was ridiculous. Celera came up with this shotgun version of the genome, and I think the results are bogus. I think it was just to get more stock options for Celera and more grants for the NIH." His sentiment, while extreme, is not unfounded: Many scientists have protested the slapdash methods that Celera used to assemble its map of the human genome so quickly. Genomics expert Barry Commoner carefully debunked Celera's dubious achievement in a widely read article in the February issue of Harper's.

Hoyt is the founder of the Coalition of Artists and Life Forms (CALF), a think tank that he says operates "with the utopic idea that artists could contribute to the dialogue about biotech and research about biotech." Hoyt, whose video "Transgenic Hairshirt" is about his relationship with his "ludicrously bred" hairless cat, was excited about the cloned kitty announcement, remarking that "this is as important a step as was the VCR or the first PC since it takes a major technology and brings it into the home in a domesticated version."

Although Hoyt and his biopunk colleagues in CALF remain committed to art that eschews commercialism, it's clear that, as Hoyt worries, "Biopunk could become a capitalist tool." In the meantime, however, he has high hopes for the ways that genomic information, if liberated, could be used. "I want superanimals who turn on their masters and give the world back to the chipmunks who were here first," he laughs, then adds, "This is with our extinction in mind, of course. I'm all for human extinction."

While trickster nihilism works fine as art, it's hardly suitable for scientific inquiry. Perhaps that's why data liberationists who do science and engineering tend to espouse rather more modest goals than the elimination or modification of our troublesome species.

At a January conference on bioinformatics organized by the computer book publisher O'Reilly & Associates, I chaired a panel called "Open Data Open Source" where data liberationist scientists and code hounds had a chance to debate the value of free software and learn more about their biopunk counterparts in the arts community. Slightly perplexed by stories of biopunk artists who want to wrest control of genomic data from corporations and participate in everything from genetic engineering experiments to protein discovery, Ewan Birney wondered, "Well, we couldn't have people doing genome gazing in the same way amateurs engage in star gazing, could we?"

Several geeks in the audience were quite taken by his comment about genome gazing. Chris Dagdigian immediately brainstormed an idea for a Web site for amateur genomics enthusiasts called Genome Gazer that would broadcast genetic information in a manner analogous to video or audio streaming.

"Basically, you could make a Web site that just streams human genetic code at you," he says. "You can get your hands on all sorts of genomes now -- they're just giant text files of alphabet characters. You could pick your favorite chromosome, download it from the government and get one of those stock ticker programs to stream the genome instead of business information."

Ann Loraine, a staff scientist who studies the human genome at biotech company Affymetrix in Emeryville, Calif., loves the concept. "In 20 years, every high school kid will be surfing the human genome online," she enthuses. "Now that the genome's sequenced, and you can get computing power for not much money, you too can investigate genes and this could help you learn how to do it."

Bring the genome to the people -- that's the biopunk way.

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