Wired

Immortal Code


The CEO goes to trial. The programmers hit the street. And yet sometimes a piece of code is so elegant, so evolved, that it outlasts everything else. To reach the former home of Gaston Bastiaens, you take a right on Myopia Road. The next left brings you to a house with a circular driveway and a raised deck out back that captures fragments of sunshine. It was here in this woodsy Boston suburb, on the morning of May 26, 2001, that a team of local police officers and US marshals found the 54-year-old software executive at home, catching some rays. Arrested and eventually shipped off to his native Belgium, Bastiaens has been accused of insider trading, violation of bookkeeping laws, and abuse of the public's confidence. He and a handful of colleagues face more than 10 years in prison.