Hypertext Essay

Some people seem to think that when you're reading a hypertext piece, the truly exciting processes are happening in the experience of orienation and reorientation within a text. Annamaria Carusi discusses the phenomenology of reader expectations and the ways in which these expectations, the ways in which they are met or subverted—and the reeling response of the reader as they process new information—are what actually form the unique [gestalten]<gestalten|(click-replace: ?gestalten)[ gestalten (an experiential *whole*)] of the hypertext experience. Wanna take it for a spin? [[Gestalten Scene<-Let's go for it!]]

You are in [a castle. The stone it is constructed with is]<cas| (Click-replace: ?cas) [ [a strange cathedral. The stone it is constructed with is]<cat| (Click-replace: ?cat) [ [the nest of the Hivemind. The walls are]<org| (Click-replace: ?org) [ [a misty forest. Its trees are]]]][charcoal black.]<vmis| (Click-replace: ?vmis) [ [milky, smooth, like marble.]<vfail| (Click-replace: ?vfail) [ [rusted roan, like clay.]<vwound| (Click-replace: ?vwound) [ [flecked with black, and shot through with violet crystalline veins.]]]] Before you is a [heavy oak door, eight feet high at least, covered in arcane glyphs]<dalone| (Click-replace: ?dalone) [ [a pool of liquid light, standing vertical and rippling under the caress of unseen hands,]<dsuic| (Click-replace: ?dsuic) [ [monolithic portal of the most lustrous metal]<dshould| (Click-replace: ?dshould) [ [curtain - nay! A tapestry of the finest silk, depicting a procession of women on their way to a sacred grove, covering a large threshold. A light breeze tugs the tapestry,]<dburied| (Click-replace: ?dburied) [ [dark, chitinous fold, oozing orange liquids from mouth-like pores,]<ddark| (Click-replace: ?ddark) [patch of thick bramble, its hoary old vines teeming with thorns, the petals of its crimson blooms angled at you like a hundred eyes. The overgrowth forms a barrier,] ] ] ] ] beyond which you can hear [the crying of a hundred thousand newborns.]<tnow| (Click-replace: ?tnow) [ [a great and terrible battle, the clangor of steel against steel, and iron beating the shape out of bones, out of flesh!]<tnot| (Click-replace: ?tnot) [ [a lovely melody, humming around and within you. It must be plucked from a harp of the gods, or a marvel of science.]<thang| (Click-replace: ?thang) [ [a mechanical whirring and an alien humming. The sound is rolling at you in waves, physically pushing you back. There is blood pouring out of your ears!]<tless| (Click-replace: ?tless) [ [a hungry, expectant silence...]<trec| (Click-replace: ?trec) [laughter. Manic, uncontrollable laughter.] ] ] ] ] You press forward, grabbing hold of [your enormous, suggestive sword and your manly resolve.]<rrest| (Click-replace: ?rrest)[ [your engraved Chinese butcher knife, $34.99 at Paderno.]<rvoid| (Click-replace: ?rvoid)[ [your unshakeable, ubiquitous guilt. That hollowness in your bones you've revisited again and again over the years, like an old photograph.]<rpeace| (Click-replace: ?rpeace)[ [your cue cards. Fuck fuck fuck, why are you only learning now that you have a nervous bladder!?]<rhuman| (Click-replace: ?rhuman)[ [your last, precious memories of sun streaming through leaves.]<rpark| (Click-replace: ?rpark)[ [your ion rifle, its nozzle a blazing red. You've only got a few shots left before it overheats completely. For good measure, you scoop up a belt of frag grenades. If you can't kill them, you'll at least slow them down.]<rmeaning| (click-replace: ?rmeaning)[ [your daughter's hand, so small and tender in your own grip. She has tears in her eyes, though she holds them back. She doesn't know what is happening. You're too scared to tell her that you don't know either.]]]]]] ] [[Continuous<-What happens next???]]

Wouldn't you like to know? Based on your configuration, you may have been able to piece together the impression of a narrative, one that was compelling enough to warrant further exploration. But whichever configuration you found most intriguing was only one of hundreds (they add up quickly). But notice how each click forced you to reorient. Maybe it was the setting? You went from imagining a castle siege to a faerie forest ritual. Maybe it was the genre? Laid-back period piece to science-fiction horror? Could have been the mood, too. Comedic Paderno knife joke to a soldier's hopeless last stand? There's some overlap, but the point is that the hypertext here was designed to take the reader's expectations (of evoked and embedded tropes and motifs), and flip them with a click. Their click. *Your* click. I did the hard work of writing a variety of scenarios, but the reader's mind completes the process of association, attempting to unite disparate pieces of information, in doing so mimicking the way that hyperlink texts work. [[MONTAGE<-It's all association. How you are going to make a story out of the pool of light and the cathedral and the laughter and the (unshakeable) guilt is not my problem.]] I'm banking on it being yours. [[Reading<-Let's go deeper.]]

Binaries are everywhere, right? Here's some of [[Binaries<-the wonderful Thomas King]]'s work to prove it. According to Jagoda "Critical making may not be radical, but it does unsettle the binary between practice and theory, the actor and the spectator" (359). Hypertext, critically-made hypertext even more, also serves to blur the line between who is a reader and who is a writer, who is the author of a work of text. Wreaders (a portmanteau of writers and readers), also known as "secondary authors," are able to claim responsibility in the development of a hypertext simply by consuming it. This is because [[Collab<-the reader's choice of associative links is their own, though it may have been designed by a writer.]]

"Hypertext is nonsequential, with imbedded links that allow the reader to structure the discussion. Under these circumstances, evaluations of arguments can be as varied as the links one follows within the hypertext," (Rusciano and Xia 220). Therefore with a large hypertext, permeated with links, it is possible for a reader to have taken a unique path through hyperlinks. The Internet provides an unfathomable connectivity between uncountable lexia, but it is not as collaborative as other hypertexts. Works of hypertext fiction and poetry are more so, and give the wreader agency by allowing them to steer the course of the story, or to build the poem by themselves. The output is constrained by rules, of course, but can offer readers a responsive and meaningful impact on traditionally static text. [[HOTCOLD<-Marshall McLuhan]] offers us some vocabulary that will contextualize the interactive nature of hypertext. Or, [[LearnToThink<-'wread' an election scenario]] to explore the ways a reader can claim agency in a hypertext and change the way it is read. Also, it is worth exploring the participatory nature of [[Critical Making]] while you're on the topic.

Anna Carusi's understanding of the phenomenology of reading is that this process is continuous: [The act of reading...]<act| (Click-replace: ?act) [ [The act of reading... Reaps information over time.]] A pretty standard function for your graphing calculator. But every time the information isn't what you expect it to be there is a moment where expectations collapse, forcing "the reader to modify his/her horizon of expectations, and on the basis of this modified horizon, project a different set of expectations onto the next moment of reading" (Carusi 174). So something like: [The act of reading...]<act1| (Click-replace: ?act1) [ [The act of reading... Reaps information over time...]<reap| (Click-replace: ?reap) [ [The act of reading... Reaps information over time... Subverting the reader's expectations...]<subv| (Click-replace: ?subv) [ [The act of reading... Reaps information over time... Subverting the reader's expectations... Forcing them to reorient based on new & old information...]<reor| (click-replace: ?reor) [The act of reading... Reaps information over time... Subverting the reader's expectations... Forcing them to reorient based on new & old information... Encouraging the reader to continue under new expectations. ]]]] [[Orient<-But isn't that part of all reading, then?]]

"Juxtaposing shots makes them collide or conflict and it is from the collision that meaning is produced. A simple illustrative example, provided by Eisenstein himself: the first set of shots depicts a poor woman and her undernourished child seated at a table upon which there is an empty bowl; cut to the second set of shots depicting an overweight man with a golden watch and chain stretched over his fat belly: he is seated at a table groaning with food - the rapid juxtaposition of these two sets of images through fast editing cause a collision that in rum creates a third set of images (construed in the **spectator's** mind), that of the oppression of the proletariat by the bourgeoisie." (Hayward 96) The Soviet montage, like in the propagandistic example above, operates in a similar way as the hypertext in the cathedral/pool of light/laughter story. Each one of the options you chose is a hypothetical 'shot,' eliciting a mental image, that has no inherent relation to the other 'shots'. Your brain is a particle collider smashing together bits and bytes of sensory information to create understanding. In a movie, those bytes are the images rushing at you 24 times a second. In hypertext, it's the content of [lexias]<lexia|, which you stitch together and contextualize in your inate desire to understand. (click-append: ?lexia)[ (discrete units of text)] [[Montp<-"Isn't that what reading is, though?"]]

Each reorientation, each new moment, gives birth to a new *gestalten*, a new assumed structural whole, with which to move forward. When you're reading *Pride & Prejudice* this probably happens with every plot point or story beat, because Jane Austen wrote it that way. When you're reading a hypertext like the crazy pseudo-vignette you just went through, it happens all the time. What's more, you're the one who's controlling the development of the text. By reading, you are helping to write a singular, retrospective understanding of the text. Your very own gestalten. Some scholars are referring to you as a "wreader" when you do this (Carusi 166). Puns never were my thing, but it's not a bad term. [[Wreader<-"What's a wreader?"]] [[Deeper<-"There's more to this gestalten thing..."]]

You're onto something. Let's give it a whirl here. Put your cursor on the "c". [c]<c| (mouseover-append: ?c)[ [a]<a|] (mouseover-append: ?a)[ [t]<t|] (mouseover-append: ?t)[ [s]<s|] (mouseover-append: ?s)[ [e]<e|] (mouseover-append: ?e)[ [a]<a2|] (mouseover-append: ?a2)[ [t]<t2|] (mouseover-append: ?t2)[ [r]<r|] (mouseover-append: ?r)[ [a]<a3|] (mouseover-append: ?a3)[ [c]<c2|] (mouseover-append: ?c2)[ [i]<i|] (mouseover-append: ?i)[ [s]<s2|] (mouseover-append: ?s2)[ [t]<t3|] (mouseover-append: ?t3)[ [s]] As the data became apparent and entered your brain, your understanding of the sentence adapted. It happened slowly, true, but that's how you're reading this sentence too, just at a much faster pace. So notice how with each new letter, new meaning was created [as well?]<racist|(mouseover-append: ?racist)[ You probably thought it was going to end with "rats," didn't you?] Each letter that popped up augmented the message that was being communicated. On their own, letters usually don't have meaning. Their ability to communicate is relational, based on how you process the connection of one letter to those following and preceding it. Pretend you're a computer for a second, and you're running a simulation or a video game. A good one. You're being fed data in ones and zeros, millions of bytes every millisecond. You are rendering the world around you as you process this information. But you're never actually experiencing it in real time, and there's always the slightest of delays. In the computer analogy, you're never experiencing external "reality." Guess what? That's how humans operate, too. Every sense you have is an input. But notice how the reading example above was linear (one letter neatly after another) and the computer example is simultaneous (it's all happening at once, and you're doing your best to get it all). [[Lineartext<-Text is linear by nature]], and cannot be experienced all at once. Hypertext can't either, but it doesn't have to be linear. [[Nonlinear<-"How so?"]]

“For the real word 'nevertheless', the sounded word, cannot ever be present all at once, as written words deceptively seem to be. Sound exists only when it is going out of existence. By the time I get to the 'the-less', the 'ne-ver' is gone. To the extent that it makes all of a word appear present at once, writing falsifies. Recalling sounded words is like recalling a bar of music, a melody, a sequence in time. A word is an event, a happening, not a thing, as letters make it appear to be." (Ong 24-25) “For a text to be intelligible, to deliver its message, it must be reconverted into sound, directly or indirectly, either really in the external world or in the auditory imagination. All verbal expression, whether put into writing, print, or the computer, is ineluctably bound to sound forever.” (Ong 31) When you're reading there's an internal monologue chiming along, isn't there? Sometimes you'll even feel your tongue trying to help voice mute words. When you read "124 was spiteful," can you feel your tongue tip-tapping the roof of your mouth? That's the act of translation, happening in your head, and unconsciously on your tongue. So... [Sound is an event that occurs over linear time...]<sound| (Click-append: ?sound) [ [ Writing is an act of translating sound...]<transsound| (Click-append: ?transsound) [ [ Reading is an act of translating symbols to internal sound...]<subv| (Click-append: ?subv) [ [ Reading mirrors the event-over-time linearity of sound.]]]] Hypertext is writing, but it is non-linear in its arrangement of [lexias]<lexia|.(click-append: ?lexia)[ (discrete units of text)] [[Nonlinear<-"How so?"]]

Enter Schema Theory, which has some major crossover with the concept of the disruption of a reader's expectations and 'whole' experience. First, what are [[schemata]]? Both gestalten and schemata are unconscious systems of expectation. Schema theory provides us with some insight into the re/orientation that takes place when reading hypertexts. Alice Bell writes “once a link is followed, readers will reconcile what they do find with what they thought they were going to find - that is, their schemata may need to be adjusted accordingly" (146). According to Bell, engaging with hypertext forces "readers to engage in an oscillation between interference and subsequent retrospective interpretation." (145) This could be the links in the castle/cathedral/Hivemind excercise. It could be the mood change from spilt milk to a tense family drama. It could be when you unsuspectingly click on a link in Facebook and it takes you to a Christian blog, or a retail website. Your association between what you were looking for and what you found is altered. In schema theory, you log that the path you took deviated from expectations. This informs your schema for future hypertext navigation. In the gestalten theory, your 'whole' is disrupted and you attempt to reorient it based on the new data. [[Evaluation<-"Okay... But what if you don't reorient?"]]

It turns out the advent of the Internet, the world's largest hypertext, has worried a number of people about the construction of a *gestalten*: an experiential whole, a corpus of text that has been processed, or otherwise framed by the reader. Frank Louis Rusciano and Yun Xia write: "Hypertext may lower the sense of political efficacy among those who rely upon it for information, though. Faced with large numbers of links, and embedded links, in response to a search for information, a citizen may feel incapable of mastering sufficient knowledge for effective participation. This problem is compounded by the lack of reliability, and false starts toward information, that many of the links define. An abundance of potential information, instead of empowering individuals in the society, might simply overwhelm them, actually increasing their sense of powerlessness. . . . Indeed, there is evidence that suggests individuals become impatient with the abundance of websites presented to them, so they abandon the deep reading that leads to increased knowledge about issues." (221) [[Eval2<-"Information overload?"]]

Marshall McLuhan's separation of [[Celsius<-hot and cool media]] is useful in the examination of hypertext and regular text. According to this dichotomy, "the fixed, linear specificity of... alphabetic writing and then print had long been one of its defining characteristics, rendering it a hot medium par excellence" (Levenson 114). Novels and articles communicate information directly, asking for no participation from the reader, and needing no guesswork or extrapolation. It is not interactive. It is designed solely to transmit. By contrast, "the Web and its hyperlinks thus comprise a quintessential case of a cool system—a verdant breeze wending its way through every leaf in the hothouse of knowledge, not only cooling but pollinating as it moves along" (Levenson 117). These media need interaction, they operate by engagement. The reader cannot remain passive in their consumption. Every click in the associative network of a hypertext is informed by guesswork and extrapolation. (These are, in part, [[Deeper<-the schematic systems of expectation]] readers have that Bell discusses). Levenson continues to write: "Online text thus seems cool to the point of approaching Kelvin’s zero. Yet it traffics patently in a species of print, and mostly prose at that—media whose aspects when expressed in newspapers, magazines, and books are among McLuhan’s favorite examples of hot, high-definition packages" (107). Here is a piece of hypertext fiction from an rpg/story I wrote called "[[Black Crypt 2<-Cityscape]]". Note the ways in which the text tries to engage with the reader.

One of the great things about hypertext is the way in which it can present multiple viewpoints and challenge the POVs readers are accustomed to in traditional, print media. There are books that attempt to show events from a variety of perspectives, and these may be print hypertexts with indexes, but they cannot do this with the same effectiveness as digital hypertexts. Geoff Ryman's Internet novel 253 is a fantastic example of this. The novel is in the format of 7 cars of a London Underground train, each with 36 people on board. The reader is free to interact with the people, clicking on any passenger's seat and examining their current mental state, a vignette of their personal history, and their relationship to other passengers. Their stories progress over the journey, and each one is unique. They all head towards death. Let's make a much less ambitious example: [[MilkNex<-Who Spilt The Milk?]]

Notice how the links in this essay have often been written as questions, presumably spoken by a well-behaved reader? (That's you.) I've given them a context that makes them purposive, not simply associative. My purpose, of course, has been to build a logical flow of ideas - and I'm being transparent. But it was manipulation nonetheless, and it's the bread and butter of hypertexts. Anna Carusi writes "links are put there by people, and are fully as significant and potentially as manipulative as other textual means." (177) Who determines what is associative linking? Who determines where it should link to? Why this word and not another? The writer does, and the logical constructions of a hypertext is limited to the number of hyperlink paths a reader can follow. Of course, a regular static text does not afford this level of complexity, but the medium is transparent. To try out a hypertext scenario which uses manipulative links, proceed to this [[LearnToThink<-election scene)]]. [[ManLex<-"What about lexia?"]]

Each lexia, or node in the hyperlink, is a discrete amount of information. It doesn't matter if the hypertext is Wikipedia or a choose-your-own-adventure. In that sense lexias are manipulative the same as any form of text. But it is the association between lexias that makes hypertext so powerful. Therefore the way the reader associates one node with another is where the really interesting stuff happens. That's the mechanism by which schematic preservation or refreshing occurs. [[ManHyp<-"What about links?"]]

While Critical Making often denotes a form of creation that is collaborative, based in "[[Ratto<-shared construction, joint conversation, and reflection]]," the Twine essay you're reading right now was more-or-less built by a guy sitting in his own little world in front of the all-encompassing glow of a computer screen (Ratto 253). But, true to the interconnected world of hypertext ([[Twinecommunity<-and true to the online community of Twine writers/modders/hackers]]), it was written with a reliance on threads and tutorials, videos and FAQs, in order to get the code all in place. In that sense, writing Twine stories is like workshopping. The Twine writer leaps into the (robust) documentation to get the basics, but quickly learns to use the forum, finding other writers with different areas of expertise, writing and rewriting lines of CSS, discovering where the limits of HTML lie, uncovering new tricks from the veteran writers... My own Twine works have always evolved as they were written. Sloppy code tightens up. New ways of displaying information are added or appear by chance. Sometimes a specific task isn't working so you drop it for a few months and voila, you get it to work. If you've visited the montage section of this essay, you saw some funky new codework I picked up. But you have to get to there first! This essay is an associative hypertext, after all. You'll notice it's organized into a few main themes (though there are many connections so you might bounce around): How do we read? What happens to us when we read hypertext? What happens to hypertext when we read it? How can hypertext present new opportunities for digital storytelling and navigation? Here are two good places to begin the journey. Of course, you can use the [[Directory]] if you need to, but only if you need to. It's cheating. [[ReadingExperience<-(RE)Orienting hypertext with an exercise...]] [[MultiplePOV<-Hypertextual perspective...]]

"The final prototypes are not intended to be displayed and to speak for themselves. Instead, they are considered a means to an end, and achieve value though the act of shared construction, joint conversation, and reflection. Therefore, while critical making organizes its efforts around the making of material objects, devices themselves are not the ultimate goal. Instead, through the sharing of results and an ongoing critical analysis of materials, designs, constraints, and outcomes, participants in critical making exercises together perform a practice-based engagement with pragmatic and theoretical issues." (Ratto 253) This digital work is more in line with the "practice-based engagement with pragmatic and theoretical issues" side of Ratto's understanding of critical making. Paralleling this, Patrick Jagoda writes that critical making celebrates an integrated “thinking-through-practice” method (359). In this sense the work of creating the project, whether physical or digital, is the engagement Ratto is looking for. I've certainly taken the opportunity to think through these issues as I write this essay (and as I write it in Twine). It has become a bit of a sprawling exploration of various avenues of theory relating to the field of hypertext, but not unmanageable for me. "Thinking-through-practice" is an incredibly valuable experience, and has immense benefit for students of the Humanities, including English. Hypertext is especially powerful in this regard because it mimics the associative process of the brain in the creation of arguments and essays. By writing a born-in-Twine hypertext essay I've been able to link together ideas in ways a traditional print essay limits me from. Humanities programs are often buried in texts and big ideas, but the opportunity to craft with those ideas in mind - to create and reorient the act of creation, to merge intangible ideas with physical and digital creation - really takes the Humanities into new and exciting territory for students. [[CollabCreation<-Back]]

"Why critical making?" Allow me to answer a question with a question, a simple one, and the basis of critical making and critical design: Why do [epistemé]<knowledge|(click-append: ?knowledge)[ (knowledge)] and [technê]<craft|(click-append: ?craft)[ (craft)] have to be separate? (Jagoda 358) Jagoda points to a historical, cultural privilege given to the written word and academia as it exists in monographs and journal articles. By contrast, it's easy to say that makers are just messing around, or playing. Jagoda is not supporting these arguments. He is trying to show that they are faulty. Playing to these prejudices, however, critical making can be rooted firmly in academic writing. While Matt Ratto situates himself within "design-oriented research," this essay and tutorial began with theoretical texts and were built in an attempt to engage with them, and are therefore situated in the school of "research-oriented design" (Ratto 254). [[CollabCreation<-"How is this Critical Making?"]]

Instead of presenting a series of events, hypertext fiction can present readers with a network of events out of chronological order. With careful application of hyperlinks, authors can use this technique and still use literary devices that require a sense of linear time, like foreshadowing. If the structure is not crafted carefully, however, the story can come across to the reader as disjointed and nonsensical. The same way this essay enables a reader to jump from one subject to another by way of association, hypertext fiction (especially Twine stories) excel at using assocations in text to jump to different events. Usually these jumps are in character, and the association is a memory imprinted on the story. An example of associative hyperlinking in this essay is the Spilt Milk scenario, which explores the [[MultiplePOV<-multiplicity of perspectives]] that hypertext can present. Instead of seeing one event through multiple eyes, however, we can imagine what it might look like to branch off from one person into different times of their life, relevant memories, personal triumphs or regrets.

Based on Patrick Jagoda's description of maker spaces, this communal optimism is seemingly a part of critical making: "The labs encourage play, construction, testing, and the iteration of ideas, creating a mood that departs from atmospheres of critical demystification and unmasking." (Jagoda 361) Maker spaces are becoming more and more common in universities, but you can always find them on the Internet. [[CollabCreation<-Back]]

**Looking for a topic?** [[Introduction]] [[Critical Making<-Critical Making]] [[ReadingExperience<-Phenomenology of Reading]] [[MONTAGE<-Montage]] [[Lineartext<-(Non)Linearity]] [[Wreader<-Wreaders]] [[Evaluation<-Reading Hypertext: Politics and Information]] [[HOTCOLD<-Hypertext, the Cool Medium]] [[schemata<-Schema Theory, Hypertext, and Manipulation]] **Looking for a specific scene?** [[MilkNex<-Spilt Milk]] [[Gestalten Scene<-Build-Your-Own-Gestalten]] [[LearnToThink<-Learn To Think (For Yourself)]] [[Black Crypt 2<-Crypt Diving]] **This hypertext has no 'end', but it has appendixes.** [[Glossary]] [[Works Cited]]

Move, slowly. Step by step. Heartbeat by heartbeat. Every scuff of your boot calls out in this umbra. Every intake of breath is sharp and metallic. Every sickening swallow of bile pops your ears, deafening you, paralyzing you. *Shhh.* What’s that? A sound. A footstep? [[BC Stop<-stop]] [[BC Go<-GO!]]

Muscles seize. Silence reigns. The quiet is tenebrous. It drums in your ears, battering invisible walls of resolve, closing in, shrinking... There’s nothing. You’ve been holding your breath. [[Black Crypt 3<-Exhale]]

Your heart races, but your legs will not move. The quiet is tenebrous. It drums in your ears, battering invisible walls of resolve, closing in, shrinking... Nothing. You’ve been holding your breath. [[Black Crypt 3<-Exhale]]

Something screams within you, within the sinews that strangle your heart and your lungs like a serpent. Don’t let it voice that pain. You let that tension go, rushing out of you with all the constrained energy of a hound on a chain. [*In and out*]<breathe1| (Click: ?breathe1)[Good. The screaming within fades. [*In and out*]<breathe2| (Click: ?breathe2)[Panic lessens to fear. [*In and out*]<breathe3| (Click: ?breathe3)[Yes. Some equilibrium is restored, but the fear will stay with you. Gather whatever shred of wits you have. [[Black Crypt 4<-Press onwards]] ] ] ]

*How?* Dark is dimensionless. It has no limits, and your eyes dart here and there searching for an end to the torture. All walls have melted away into void. One step or one eternity, you cannot mark the confines of this prison. How can you move onwards if there is no map, no compass scrawled in the architecture? [[BC Miracle<-"I need a miracle"]] [[BC Reason<-"I need to think"]]

That’s it? Sit and wait for divine intervention? You’d die of starvation in the time wasted, if you could avoid the sinister intellects that stalk this abyss. [[BC Miracle 2<-Nevermind, cool heads prevail]]

Yes, reason. It burns in your body like alcohol. Use it. You make your way slowly, quietly, and surely towards the span of black you last saw the door. Your arms are held in front of you, fingers splayed like insectoid feelers, ready for the sensory flash of contact. It takes an age, but you make it. The stone is cut sharp into cubes, stacked to make a column on either side of the entranceway. [[Shades<-Enter the chamber]]

Aaaaaaaand some stuff happens, no spoilers. Notice how the text was interactive: it required the reader to use the links not just to move between lexias, but to progress within a lexia. It was also reactive, forming a different pathway for the stop/go and logic/reason choices, which create short personalized experiences and then merge back into the main line of hypertext. The Cityscape game is full of side-avenues that the reader is encouraged to explore: they offer new information, new items, and can have significant impact on the main plot. Finally, the text was able to resist the reader. If you chose the logical "I need to think" option, the game responded with something like "Seriously? We're giving you an out here. Take it!" The opposite occurs if the reader chose the miracle option. Hypertext is able to accomodate this feature of metafiction in a way traditional print texts can't quite do. Hypertext (and especially hypertext fiction) has the tools to be a cool medium in the extreme. The methods used in Cityscape throughout its body are similar to those used in immersive, narrative-rich games from AAA companies like BioWare and Ubisoft. Since you've made it to a significant point, here's access to the [[Directory]] so you can go to another topic or revisit the sections relating to this scenario. Or you could check out another excercise that explores [[ReadingExperience<-how we create a 'whole' when reading]], and how hypertext challenges this. Alternatively, visit the section on [[schemata<-schema theory and the ways hypertext can manipulate]] the reader.

That’s it? This is not a puzzle, this is survival, and you are caught in a prison for the dead. Take the miracle, you’ll live longer. [[BC Reason 2<-Accept the improbable]]

Deux ex machina, or product of fate, you’ve always known the City was tainted by the undercurrent of some unreality, a power holding one foot within the laws of the visible and tangible, and another foot holding open the door to a place outside of rules, confines, and substance. You cannot name this power. It is a god. It is an idle thought. It is you, and the dead who watch with gaping, empty eye sockets. Nameless, formless, almighty and absurd… A scream echoes through the crypt. [[Shades<-The darkness quivers...]]

My submission for this assignment is a multimedia digital tutorial called "How To Be A Human" and this essay, which was born in the Twine program (as opposed to being written in Microsoft Word and pasted into Twine). The tutorial is built using simple folders and text files, as well as complex Twine scenarios, with the intention of teaching a prospective-Human how to navigate digital environments and interact with the world in general. [[Media<-"Why use these media?"]] [[Theory<-"What theory will this engage with?"]]

"Why use these media?" In the tutorial, the folders and simple .txt files are juxtaposed with the hypertext scenarios in a number of ways which will be unpacked in the course of this essay. Here the medium itself is central to the argument, and the reader/player is able to experience the argument, not just follow along with it. Primarily, the tutorial examines the responsiveness and control a reader has over regular text versus hypertext. The tutorial does this by presenting the player/reader with unresponsive text files. The reader is free to type into the files, and is even prompted to, but receives no response. These formats engage with the question of reader choice or reader agency. Twine scenarios allow a reader to alter the outcome of the story and create their own version of it, being both responsive to specific inputs, and giving the reader some measure of agency, while the .txt files remains static regardless of what the reader does. Interactive hypertexts are also cool media, which this essay explores in greater depth. All of these things could be written about in a conventional essay, and have been, but this essay and the tutorial incorporate the reader in the construction of the argument. [[Foldscape<-"Are there other projects that do something similar?"]] [[Theory<-"What about the theory?"]]

This essay explores the way humans interact with hypertext and the implications of these forms of interactions. It primarily uses hypertext theorists and media theorists to explore these themes. Of the theorists we examined in class, Walter Ong and Marshall McLuhan are important. The essay uses scenarios from the tutorial "How To Be A Human," unpacking them and their effects. It also presents new hypertext scenarios to explore other ideas. The [[Directory]] features a list of areas investigated. [[Media<-"What about the medium?"]] [[Critical Making<-"Why Critical Making?"]]

"...the elemental structure of Western society. And cranky old Jacques Derrida notwithstanding, we do love our dichotomies. Rich/poor, white/black, strong/weak, right/wrong, culture/nature, male/female, written/oral, civilized/barbaric, success/failure, individual/communal. We trust easy oppositions. We are suspicious of complexities, distrustful of contraditions, fearful of enigmas." (King 25) [[Wreader<-Go back]] to see how hypertext can confound binaries...

Cool media - Subtle, low-profile media that demans participation and engagement, extrapolation, and acive consumption. Epistemé - Knowledge. Gestalten - An experiential whole, framed by understanding and/or expectation. Hot media - Unsubtle, clear, high-profile media with direct transmittance. No participation required. Hypertext - A text in which documents/lexia are linked together via an associative system. Lexia - A unit of text, a document or node in a hypertext. Montage - In this context, an associative collision that produces meaning. Schema - A system of expectations or store of knowledge, based on previous experience and what cultural teaching. Technê - Craft, art, skill. Wreader - A portmanteau of reader and writer. Back to the [[Directory]].

Alice Bell refers to hypertext's ability to "tune" existing schemata of the reader, where tuning refers to the process in which “existing schemata… serve as the base for the development of new ones” (145). This is not unlike the reorientation of gestalten that Carusi discusses in her examination of the phenomenology of reading hypertexts. Bell's case study goes further, however, and she points to two specific operations of reading hypertexts, especially hypertexts that are ideological or otherwise manipulative. If the reader perceives the attempt at manipulation, there will be "schema preservation" in which the original schemata are left untouched, though new ones may still develop through "tuning" (154). Otherwise, there will be "schema refreshing," in which the text is able to alter the existing schemata and the dogma or ideology is passed on. The process is viral in that it seeks to implant its genetic code into an existing system. By reading hypertexts, like browsing the Internet, readers are 'tuning' (or being tuned?) with every act of navigation, and are engaged in a constant process of schema preservation and refreshing. The knowledge stores and expectations of people are thus altered significantly over time. How else are hyperlinks manipulative? [[ManHyp<-"Can the hyperlinks be manipulative?"]] [[ManLex<-"Can the lexias be manipulative?"]]

"All derivations of schema theory rest on the premise that when faced with any situation, individuals activate a knowledge store - a schema - which is based on previous experience and culturally learned" (Bell 143). In a sense these schemata are reflexive, then. But they activate knowledge which is vague, specific, and varied, such as ideological and dogmatic belief, the meaning of a specific word, or how to speak to a police officer. In Althusserian terms, then, when we are interpellated by ideology, we are solicited into following schematic behaviours. [[Deeper<-"How do schemata relate to gestalten?"]] [[Tuning<-"Can hypertexts manipulate our schemata?"]]

More or less. In this model, the reader is not just presented with too much information, but too many sources and too many perspectives. Sacred plurality of information and journalism becomes a multiplicity which becomes a multiverse or an inundation or a deluge. Suddenly, being an informed netizen has a ridiculously high barrier to entry and you're not sure what's going on or what to read, so you become the digital equivalent of a shut-in, or you trap yourself in a [[filter bubble]] of puppy videos and memes. Every "false start" towards information is a failure. You feel powerless. Netizens are trained not to deep read both by the false-start model and by [[Headlines<-salacious CAPS-LOCK headlines]]. Note, however, that this multiplicity is key to the way hypertext fiction works, and can provide unique works in regards to [[MultiplePOV<-point of view]].

Frank Louis Rusciano and Yun Xia also write this about the "Google generation" (referring to people born after 1993), as discussed in a five-year study from University College London and the British Library: "Most of them read only one to two pages of a site before hopping to another site. This surface reading pattern is directed by the associative system in the web structure through different hypertext links. In addition, the study also discovers that young people in virtual libraries use up a lot of time simply fumbling their way around on the web. They spend more time in the process of navigation than reading content. Thus, the study concludes, “It is clear that users are not reading online in the traditional sense, indeed there are signs that new forms of ‘reading’ are emerging as users ‘power browse’ horizontally through titles, contents pages and abstracts going for quick wins.” (220) The ability to navigate hypertexts is therefore crucial to our ability to use them effectively and not drown in an information overload. [[Headline2<-"Continue..."]]

Porpentine's Foldscape (available for free at https://porpentine.itch.io/foldscape) uses folders and text files to create a minimalist world to explore through clicks, sparse text, and very simple ASCII art. ASCII art uses basic keyboard symbols to represent things. Below is an example of an ASCII rabbit. (\_/) (='.'=) (")_(") Compared to what comes out of itch.io today, these are very primitive tools, and yet Porpentine manages to create an interesting experience with the basics of digital navigation. I was inspired to take this method to a different issue and compare it with hypertext. [[Critical Making<-"Why Critical Making?"]]

6:30AM The Smith Residence 440 Lactany Road, Toronto It is, regrettably, a Monday morning in January. The sun will not show its face for another half hour yet. In clockwork intervals, windows light up against the darkness. The panes of glass are crusted with ice, or otherwise blocked completely by snow. The Smith family surrounds their kitchen table. They are all very, very tired. They are all disgruntled. The harsh light of an incandescent bulb isn't helping, and they can all feel their eyes straining against it, reeling away from wakefulness. Even the baby, poor little James Smith, is blinking away sleep, sitting in his high chair, trying to look at anything other than the milk. Oh yes. Milk. That's what this is all about. All but empty, deflated here and pooling there, the sad remains of a milk bag lie on the tablecloth. The milk itself is splattered like an ivory inkblot on the dark linoleum floor. It was the last bag, and nobody's happy. Everyone hates Mondays. Everyone's a suspect. The Smith family has communication issues, clearly, but at least you're here, omniscient being, to investigate. What does [[jan<-Jan]] think of all this? [[gary<-Gary Smith]] has his hand balled in a fist, resting on his waist. This family is driving [[olivia<-Olivia]] insane. [[Henry<-Henry]] is midway through brushing his teeth. [[james<-Baby James]]... Well, he's hanging in there.(set: $cat to false) [[Who did it?]]

Jan can't stop looking at the pool of milk. She refuses to clean it up. She was in the basement when she heard the crash. Ironically, she was getting a Swiffer. What if it was [[jxhenry<-Henry?]] Why hasn't he said anything? How can you raise a kid to be honest these days? [[MilkNex<-Go Back]]

He says he was downstairs because Olivia was using the second floor washroom. Jan doesn't know what to believe. The cat is licking the milk now. Maybe she wouldn't have to clean it after all. [[MilkNex<-Go Back]]

What's Gary going to put into his morning coffee now? Maybe they had some whipping cream in the fridge, god help them. No. No cream. Not ever. Gary has his coffee down to a science. The formula is... well, it's scientific, it's perfect, it's everything! It makes even Mondays just a little bit better. [[gxjan<-Jan]] probably thinks it was him. [[MilkNex<-Go Back]]

They'd had a fight that Saturday. About Olivia, about money, about alcohol. Jan had been keeping score for years now, it seemed, always watching for a slip-up, always using the fallout as ammunition for her pistol. He couldn't make another mistake. No, not today. [[MilkNex<-Go Back]]

Baby James can sense tension in the room. Nobody knows it, but babies are pretty good at picking up negative vibes. Goodness, the plastic bag on the table, empty and wet, looks so sad. Just lying there. James had been at the scene of the crime, this is true. But he was sleeping when it happened. Fluffy kitty had pounced onto the table, tip-toed over to the high chair. So soft! Sometimes James wore her tail like [[bxgary<-dadda]] wore a mustache. [[MilkNex<-Go Back]]

They laugh every time he drinks the bitter brown water, sticks his tongue out. But dadda is proud of his drink. Same way Baby James likes his cereal smushy and no one else does so it's special. Without his coffee dadda is slow and maybe he's too slow and clumsy, maybe he knocked the milk [[MilkNex<-Go Back]]

Examining the effects of hypertexts through the lens of Benedict Anderson's *Imagined Communities*, Rusciano and Xia write: "Hypertext could create individual readers that have virtually no common basis for communication. The result would go beyond Balkanization to atomization, where a mass society of individuals finds it difficult to find even like-minded others with whom to discuss issues. The result could be a mass society defined by weak links among citizens and easily open to manipulation." (220) In some cases this might refer to a filter bubble that an individual constructs around themselves in a digital space, ignoring the multiplicity of lexias in the world, and choosing selectively which they will choose to read. The result are people that do not feel the patriotic togetherness of being in the same nation. The result are people who believe one cluster of lexias over all others. "Fake News" comes to mind. You may be worried about the "easily open to manipulation" part. [[schemata<-Schema theory]] can help us determine the relationship between hypertexts and our behaviours and beliefs. [[Eval2<-Go Back]]

In McLuhan's traditional dichotomy, hot media deliver information directly in high definition and clarity. They are unsubtle compared to cool media, and do not invite us to participate: "Hot is fast cars indeed, fast food, life in the fast lane, encounters quick, overwhelming, intense—hot buns, hot abs, hot babes and hunks, embrassez-moi, run me over and leave me senseless" (Levenson 110). Cold media are "wispy, tinkly sketches," and their "soft, low-profile demeanors invite our involvement to complete or bring to life the quiet evening" (Levenson 106). [[HOTCOLD<-"So which is text? And hypertext?"]]

Referring to gestalten and the formulation of a whole, Carusi writes of hypertext: "The disadvantage most often complained about is that it can lead to superficial readings, if readers engage in a reading process which takes them from one association to the next without the building up of a horizon of expectations in terms of which to make their selections. Selecting one link as opposed to another is similar to but also very different from making the connections which result in the formation of gestalten." (176) By following hyperlinks too quickly, readers forgoe deep reading and do not allow the lexias to formulate a whole, interpretive text. The movement between a few articles in Wikipedia could produce, when the articles are read and considered together, an interesting gestalten. Otherwise the reader can only make connections based on easily found facts, blockquotes, or else make no connections at all. As an excercise, try the Random Page button on Wikipedia. Read the page you land on and follow a link that interests you. Read that page and do the same for another link. [[Eval2<-Go back]]

It's voting day! There are two parties to vote for: the [[laterals<-Laterals]] and the [[verticals<-Verticals]]. If you are ready to vote, do so now. I vote for: [[vlat<-The Laterals!]] [[vver<-The Verticals!]] [[nvo<-I don't want to vote.]] (set: $hp to 0)

The tension grows. The Smiths will remember this event for months, if not years. [[POVend<-Not the happy ending they deserve...]]

The Lateral's flag is three diagonal stripes in white, orange, and red. Their leader is on the face of a cool magazine, has had at least one unsolicited dick pic scandal, and has a family of four. Their ad campaign included a waving flag, wolves, higher taxes for the rich, slander, and the symbolic breaking of guns. [[LearnToThink<-Go back]]

The Vertical's flag is green with a purple star in the corner. Their muscular leader has a very large mustache, piercing green eyes, and supposedly impressive chest hair. Their ad campaign included puppies, anti-abortion laws, tax breaks, and support for our troops. [[LearnToThink<-Go back]]

They win, for better or for worse. Why did you choose them, and participate in the narrow victory of the Verticals? [[vvis<-I liked the flag and the puppies.]] [[vsex<-The leader was shmexy.]] [[viss<-I support our troops, and anti-abortion legislation, and tax breaks. And puppies!]] (set: $verticals to true)

Glad you found something you could relate to. But how much of that did you take at face value? I didn't even show you the ads, so why trust me. Right, because it's hypothetical. What's not hypothetical is the development of literacy skills that let you read between the puppies and the gratification of a party that just "gets you," so to speak. I've got my human card so take my word for it when I say this literacy is optional, and you've got to work for it, and you can't stop working for it, and it's pretty much impossible to know if you're holding it or if that's just a pretty little fantasy. A puppy you gave yourself when you most certainly did not deserve it. The trick to it all is to interiorize and reflect. You'll soon come to realize that this is impossible to do with everything, and the amount of nastiness in the world will surely break you if you take it all in. Maybe that's justification for a social media with no bad news, or for digging a bunker thirty feet into the manicured grass of your lawn. Maybe this module is supposed to train you to kill the fear in your belly, kill the passion, kill the tension that's mounting somewhere between your solar plexus and your pain threshold. You can do that, and put everything through an analytic and robotic process. But that's not human. So live with it. (*I'm loving this voice of authority stuff. Who said I was a human, anyway? I could be a hyper-advanced AI.*) ((*Disregard that.*)) [[Thinkend<-Concluding remarks?]]

Did it occur to you that he's a robot with synthetic skin, expensive fabricated eyes, and custom Italian chest hair implants? Until you can verify the integrity of a politician's policies, or chest hair, keep emotionally cool with them. Politicians are walking, talking ab campaigns - I mean *ad* campaigns! And ads massage the truth. No, massage is too sensual a verb, especially for our green-eyed robohunk. They repackage the truth. Rebrand it. Rational thinking suggests we look past the person and the packaging and instead focus on their arguments. But you want to be a human, and humans are only on occassion rational. So good job! You're getting the hang of it! Continue to make illogical decisions and you'll quickly find that you are one of a community of people, a community that can be defined and constricted to a political sphere. Home, after all, is where you feel least persecuted. +1 Human Point (set: $hp to it+1) (set: $nvonolike to true) [[Thinkend<-Concluding remarks?]]

Okay, aesthetics on point. Everyone likes a good flag, and EVERYONE likes puppies. But is this election really about puppies? No, it's about issues. And I'm sorry to say it, but you've got some. It's a human's responsibility to look for ways to improve the world around them. Altruism and empathy are the cornerstones of animal communities and human group dynamics. And group competition, which Richard Dawkins will tell you is pretty important. You don't see community or altruism in tigers or sharks, do you? I've also never seen a tiger or a shark build a skyscraper or write a tragedy for the ages (where art thou, Sharkspeare?). Correlation? Causation? Or maybe it's the human's prerogative to change the world around them? No, that sounds like bullshit to me too. Anyways, get involved! Start to find what aligns with your own moral compass, your sense of identity and curiosity, and yeah, your sense of crisis. Think, reflect, question, act. Don't take anything too seriously until you've pulled it apart, taken it all the way to the edge of seriousness and found it still bounces. Does that make sense? [[metayes2<-Yes]] [[metano2<-No]]

Great! I shouldn't have doubted the metaphor. Asking questions is human. If you want to be a human then take hold of the curiosity you feel bubbling inside of you. Wield that like a sword- no, a hammer! Way better, kinda Soviet. Capable of creation and destruction both. Interiorize, question, reflect. Plan your actions and activism accordingly. Filter the world critically and use your passion to change your reality. You'll soon come to realize that this is impossible to do with everything, and the amount of nastiness in the world will break down your spirit if you take it all in. Maybe that's justification for a social media with no bad news, or for digging a bunker into your lawn. But in contrast to what some humans-in-training who chose different paths in this tutorial might have concluded, this module is NOT supposed to train you to kill your fear, or your passion, or the tension between your ability to process information and your ability to act on it. You could do that, and put everything through an analytic and robotic process. But that's not very human. So do what you can. And watch out for the ads! +1 Human Point (set: $hp to it+1) [[Thinkend<-Concluding remarks?]]

Well, at least asking questions is human, so don't be afraid to say if you don't understand. If you want to be a human then take hold of the curiosity you feel bubbling inside of you. Wield that like a sword- no, a hammer! Way better, kinda Soviet. Capable of both creation and destruction. Interiorize, question, reflect. Plan your actions and activism accordingly. Filter the world critically and use your passion to change your reality. You'll soon come to realize that this is impossible to do with everything, and the amount of nastiness in the world will break down your spirit if you take it all in. Maybe that's justification for a social media with no bad news, or for digging a bunker into your lawn. But in contrast to what some humans-in-training who chose different paths in this tutorial might have concluded, this module is NOT supposed to train you to kill your fear, or your passion, or the tension between your ability to process information and your ability to act on it. You could do that, and put everything through an analytic and robotic process. But that's not very human. So do what you can. And watch out for the ads. +1 Human Point (set: $hp to it+1) (No, the test isn't broken. You said no, good for you. But this is a lesson: even if you accept the call to action, human-in-training, there's no guarantee you'll ever make a difference. Tough love.) [[Thinkend<-Concluding remarks?]]

They win, for better or for worse. Why did you choose them, and participate in the narrow victory of the Laterals? [[lvis<-I read cool magazines and the flag really appealed to me! Also those wolves really represent what we need for government right now. Growl.]] [[lsex<-I like how their leader has a family (and therefore family values). I also can't stop looking at that dick pic...]] [[liss<-I'm in it to tax those rich b@$+@rds and break some guns!]] (set: $laterals to true)

Okay, aesthetics on point. Everyone likes a good flag, and EVERYONE likes wolves. But is this election really about wolves? No, it's about issues. And I'm sorry to say it, but you've got some. It's a human's responsibility to look for ways to improve the world around them. Altruism and empathy are the cornerstones of animal communities and human group dynamics. And group competition, which Richard Dawkins will tell you is pretty important. You don't see community or altruism in tigers or sharks, do you? I've also never seen a tiger or a shark build a skyscraper or write a tragedy for the ages (where art thou, Sharkspeare?). Correlation? Causation? Or maybe it's the human's prerogative to change the world around them? No, that sounds like bullshit to me too. Anyways, get involved! Start to find what aligns with your own moral compass, your sense of identity and curiosity, and yeah, your sense of crisis. Think, reflect, question, act. Don't take anything too seriously until you've pulled it apart, taken it all the way to the edge of seriousness and found it still bounces. Does that make sense? [[metayes2<-Yes]] [[metano2<-No]]

Glad you found something you could relate to. But how much of that did you take at face value? I didn't even show you the ads, so why trust me. Right, because it's hypothetical. What's not hypothetical is the development of literacy skills that let you read between the puppies and the gratification of a party that just "gets you," so to speak. I've got my human card so take my word for it when I say this literacy is optional, and you've got to work for it, and you can't stop working for it, and it's pretty much impossible to know if you're holding it or if that's just a pretty little fantasy. A puppy you gave yourself when you most certainly did not deserve it. The trick to it all is to interiorize and reflect. You'll soon come to realize that this is impossible to do with everything, and the amount of nastiness in the world will surely break you if you take it all in. Maybe that's justification for a social media with no bad news, or for digging a bunker thirty feet into the manicured grass of your lawn. Maybe this module is supposed to train you to kill the fear in your belly, kill the passion, kill the tension that's mounting somewhere between your solar plexus and your pain threshold. You can do that, and process everything through an analytic and robotic process Who said I was human, anyway? A computer program? [[Thinkend<-Concluding remarks?]]

So you chose to retain your vote? To remain silent. To be invisible. Why on earth would you do that? [[nolike<-I didn't like either of the guys running for office.]] [[mult<-I was confused and conflicted by the policies of both parties.]] [[dno<-I don't like democracy and/or I don't even get what I'm voting for!]]

That's the point! No one likes politicians! Because politicians are walking, talking ad campaigns. And ads massage the truth, big time. Maybe massage is too sensual a verb. They repackage the truth. Rebrand it. Rational thinking suggests we look past the person and the packaging and instead focus on their arguments. But you want to be a human, and humans are only on occassion rational. So good job! You're getting the hang of it! Continue to make illogical decisions and you'll quickly find that you are one of a community of people, a community that can be defined and constricted to a political sphere. Home, after all, is where you feel least persecuted. +1 Human Point (set: $hp to it+1) (set: $nvonolike to true) [[Thinkend<-Concluding remarks?]]

Confusion, outrage, frustration. These things combine to leave you feeling helpless. But you have to choose. Being a human requires you to move past instinct and to make decisions in real time, under real circumstances. And guess what? The world is not tailored to your tastes. Learn to live with it, or you'll never be human. "Do I contradict myself? very well, then, I contradict myself. I am large, I contain multitudes." (set: $nvomult to true) +1 Human Point (set: $hp to it+1) (set: $novomult to true) [[Thinkend<-Concluding remarks?]]

Well aren't you clever? This is just a thought experiment, but even that particularly evasive answer indicates something about you. You're a questioner. Or an anarchist. Either way, someone like you at some time in history was tortured and killed for the same behaviour. They asked "Why?" or "What's the point?" and they got killed for it. Terminated. Questions have consequences. When you're a human (not saying you'll get there) you have to contend with that fact that there are rules in place to make sure 'humanity' doesn't fall apart. Because 'humanity' is a city built on the back of a sleeping chimpanzee! Or something like that. Does that make sense? (set: $nvodno to true) [[metayes<-Yes]] [[metano<-No]]

Great! I shouldn't have doubted the metaphor. Asking questions is human. So is sacrificing choice and free will for the sake of civilization. You don't see self-sacrifice or altruism between tigers or sharks, do you? I've also never seen a tiger or a shark build a skyscraper or write a tragedy for the ages (where art thou, Sharkspeare?). Correlation? Causation? Who knows? It doesn't matter, in the end. By not voting, you have allowed your voice to go unheard. So keep in mind that sometimes everything you are and everything you feel and all of that raw emotion you're keeping inside will need to be focused to the tip of a pen, and summarized in a simple 'X'. At least you asked some questions. +1 Human Point (set: $hp to it+1) [[Thinkend<-Concluding remarks?]]

(set: $outcome to (random: 1,5))(if: $outcome is 1)[Hurray! The new political party turned out to be pretty good! They were able to push their agenda forward and reshape the country without crossing too many moral thresholds.](if: $outcome is 2)[Oh no! The new party has become a fascist machine! Purges are occuring daily, your neighbour was arrested last week and it's like he doesn't exist anymore. Users of hypertexts are being hunted down by the secret police...](if: $outcome is 3)[Too bad... The new political party was not able to substanitally change the way your country works. There was simply too much opposition. That's the way the democratic cookie crumbles, unfortunately.](if: $outcome is 4)[Hurray! The new political party turned out to be pretty good! They were able to push their agenda forward and reshape the country without crossing too many moral thresholds.](if: $outcome is 5)[Too bad... The new political party was not able to substanitally change the way your country works. There was simply too much opposition. That's the way the democratic cookie crumbles, unfortunately.] What you do with this information is up to you. Either way, you finished the scenario with $hp Human Point(s)! Do you feel more human now? If you want to immediately try another configuration, go [[LearnToThink<-back to the start]]. Or, [[Thinkend2<-give up and move on]]. No one is here to judge you.

Whether you came to this scenario from the manipulation, schema, or agency thread, there are some interesting parallels. Of course the tutorial was manipulative and unfair (did you see those options?! Talk about reductionism...). Moreover, what you don't know is that the final outcome is random, and you have a 20% chance of getting a fascist takeover, no matter who you chose! The suckers that stayed to try and get a happy ending are gonna be pissed. The point is that the text is reactive, and you uncovered different information based on your own series of choices. This can be expanded massively to create hypertext fiction which the reader can explore, and within which the reader can face consequences. The ability to include randomness within a text is also very powerful, and lends itself to the dice-rolling logic of role-playing games. It would not be prohibitively difficult to write a sequence in which the reader/player may gamble, or fire a gun, or fight a monster. This is the complexity that allowed for interactive games such as the Zork series. Since you've made it to a significant point, here's access to the [[Directory]] so you can go to another topic or revisit the sections relating to this scenario. Imagine what this scenario would look like written from a character's perspective? Try this scenario in order to explore how [[MultiplePOV<-point of view is impacted by the hypertext model]]. Or check out this section on [[Evaluation<-information overload]] in a hyertext and the political concerns behind it.

The foam has turned to a slimy mess of spit in his mouth. He tries not to move his tongue because it feels gross. It defnitely tastes gross too. How much longer can he hold it in his mouth? There's more and more of it every minute. But he's paralyzed. Everyone is. They're just standing there. Can't they see that his cheeks are puffed up? Is he really the one who'll have to end the tableau? [[hxolivia<-Olivia]]'s looking pretty impatient.

They were going to be late! She knew it. She dreaded the car ride to school. Mom would take them, though, and she always let them choose the radio. Mom and Dad were always fighting these days. She didn't even like breakfast... At least [[oxjames<-James]] didn't seem to mind so much.

He was sitting his high chair, looking back and forth between Mom and Dad. He was a little old to be using the chair, actually, but he liked it and there was no harm. Even though Mom used to be terrified of the cat smothering James for some reason... Maybe James spilled the milk. She wasn't sure. Wouldn't he be crying if he did it? Wasn't that what babies were supposed to do? [[MilkNex<-Go Back]]

Maybe she'd make the first move. Or maybe she did it? When had Olivia ever taken responsibility for her actions? Never. Certainly not when she broke Mom's display case. Maybe that's what Mom and Dad were thinking of. They thought he did it, maybe they thought he spilt the milk... They could try asking! Someone could do something! The uncomfortable silence grew, and so did the pool of spit in his mouth. Only the cat dared move. [[MilkNex<-Go Back]]

Bell, Alice. "Schema Theory, Hypertext Fiction and Links." *Style*, vol. 48, no. 2, 2014, pp. 140. Carusi, Annamaria. "Textual Practitioners: A Comparison of Hypertext Theory and Phenomenology of Reading." *Arts and Humanities in Higher Education*, vol. 5, no. 2, 2006, pp. 163-180. Jagoda, Patrick. "Critique and Critical Making." *PMLA: Publications of the Modern Language Association of America*, vol. 132, no. 2, 2017, pp. 356. King, Thomas. *The Truth about Stories: A Native Narrative*. House of Anansi Press, 2003. Levinson, Paul. *Digital McLuhan: A Guide to the Information Millennium*. Routledge, 1999. Ong, Walter. "Writing is a Technology that Restructures Thought." *The Written Word: Literacy in Transition*, edited by Gerd Baumann, Clarendon Press, 1986, pp. 23-50. Ratto, Matt. "Critical Making: Conceptual and Material Studies in Technology and Social Life." *The Information Society*, vol. 27, no. 4, 2011, pp. 252-260. Rusciano, Frank L., and Yun Xia. "Print-Based and Web-Based Communication: Different Ways of Thinking." *Atlantic Journal of Communication*, vol. 21, no. 4, 2013, pp. 215-229. Back to the [[Directory]].

[[b<-Baby James]]? [[j<-Jan]]? [[g<-Gary]]? [[o<-Olivia]]? [[h<-Henry]]? Surely one of them did it? But who do you cast judgement on? Who gets the [blame]<blame|?(mouseover-append: ?blame)[? Or maybe... just maybe... It was the [[cat]]!]

Henry? Maybe. Maybe he's too embarrassed to speak up. Or maybe he simply can't speak because his mouth is full and he was really brushing his teeth when it happened. [[Fin<-Either way, we'll never know.]]

Olivia? Maybe. Maybe she's just impatient and wants to leave the scene of the crime as soon as she can. Maybe she just hates the tension. [[Fin<-Either way, we'll never know.]]

Gary? Maybe. Maybe he feels like he's on thin ice. Or maybe his coffee really is all important. [[Fin<-Either way, we'll never know.]]

Jan? Maybe. I'm not buying it, though. [[Fin<-Either way, we'll never know.]]

Baby James? Maybe. Or maybe he's the innocent little cherub we want him to be. [[Fin<-Either way, we'll never know.]]

Aha! Yes! Who stands the most to gain from spilling the milk? Who has a sick desire to knock things over? For whom do the ends justify the means, and damn the consequences on this poor family? The cat! Coco the cat! (set: $cat to true) You've solved it! The Smiths realize who it must have been and look at one another in embarrassment. They'll forget this ever happened. [[POVend<-Congratulations!]]

(if: $cat is false)[Fun fact: there is a good ending to that scenario, you just have to look closely.] A longform mystery novel could use hypertext to reveal crucial pieces of information at different times in the plot, or to encourage the reader down lines of investigation that might be red herrings. The end result is something which can be more engaging than reading a static account of the spilt milk scenario. Watch out, though, because it shows a few perspectives, but does not offer "privileged access to ontological truth" (Rusciano and Xia 226). Hypertext has the capability to break down the assumption that a text can give us the truth. Recognizing that the Internet is the largest hypertext in the world, we can take it as an example of a network of lexias that gives us access to uncountable versions of reality. The fact that some of them are patently false is a troubling, yet intrinsic, part of networking the world. This scenario has some linkst to the concept of a [[HOTCOLD<-cool medium]], by hiding information, adding mystery, and demanding participation. That scenario gave the reader five points of view to consider. Check out this section on the [[Evaluation<-effects of a multiplicity of perspectives in a hypertext]]. This is also a good place to start looking at the Internet as a huge hypertext. Since you've made it to a significant point, here's access to the [[Directory]] so you can go to another topic or revisit the sections relating to this scenario.