Welcome to the Humiliating World of Professional Writing!!!!!

“I think this is not a worrying issue at all,” -Richard Sterling

Informal Style of Electronic Messages Is Showing Up in Schoolwork, Study Finds

 Lewin

I'm proud to say that I am a member of the grammar police. I don't believe I have ever used an emoticon or text shortcut in a school assignment. In private emails between me and my friends? Absolutely. I know when to turn the switch on and off.

And now here is the first of what is certainly going to be one of many parallels between theater history and this class:

today we discussed what theater is. There is not really a clear-cut definition, but the authors of Living Theater spend an extensive amount of time theorizing where it might have had its origins. One of the theories is that theater sprung from everyday life, in that we play a series of roles, such as daughter, friends, student, castmate, etc. Each is different, and in each role we act a way we wouldn't in any of the others. There is a time to be casual and a time to be formal, and :) lol omg rotfpmp don't belong in the academic world.

Maybe I'm so rigid with grammar because my fingers never had a chance to get used to texting (the whole month I had it)

speaking of grammar police, I sopt an error: shouldn't Richard Sterling have said "I don't think this is an issue to worry about at all?"

It's a substantial change in how we engage in discourse, especially in this country," -Alex Halavais, Freedom of Speech Redefined by Blogs

EL 236

It was kind of odd to see our little school in the news. By now, I'm so used to the daily blogging that I barely realize it is part of what sets us apart from other schools.

I think that one of the reasons why we have had so few violations is because we are using thiese blogs in lew of tests and quizzes. They are proof to classmates and professors that we are learning. But I believe the fact that the blogs are student blogs makes us more cautious of what we put on them. We are aware of our audience.

I believe the term "private blog" is an oxymoron. You may have it set to private, so that only youre friends can see what you write. But these accounts are easily hackable. Who hasn't been myspace spammed at least once? Both my myspace and facebook accounts have been hacked into in  the past, and while I have nothing on either short of an occasional melodramatic "I hate this class", it still wasn't pleasant to have to go and write on everyone's walls stating that I did not post hotornot.com offer (or something similar).

If you have something to say or need to vent, go down to one of your friend's dorm rooms and have a chat. Or keep a diary-a paper one. Or go to Toys-R-Us and buy one of those inflatable bop bags and go at it.

I can't believe I've written that many...anyhow

since there is no slot for turnitin.com for EL 405, here is my goal statement:

Daniella Choynowski

8/27/2008

New Media Projects

Dr Jerz

Goal Statement

1. Blender 3-D

   This one is easily the most complex of the programs we will be using. Just by opening the program, you can see that it has at least a hundred buttons. Trying to make Blender work for me will probably be like trying to read hieroglyphics: incredibly hard, but doable. When researching Blender online, I found that I was barely able to understand the language describing the functions: widget, python expressions, LBM, etc. I really don't even know where to begin. I think that Blender will probably be the “El 336 research paper” of the semester, by which I mean that I will be very glad once I have conquered it, but will hate the process.

2. Adobe Flash

   This is the tool I am most excited to use. I have wanted to learn how to make a flash animated cartoon ever since I saw Neil Cicierega's cartoons. Neil created a genre called animutation, which is essentially a flash animation parody of pop culture. Basically, this is where I move beyond my observational sarcasm print cartoons. From what I gather from my research, all the characters in flash cartoons are created in a drawing applications, which is great for me because I cannot draw well. There is a reason why there is only a man's hand in my next Setonian cartoon-all human characters end up looking like stick figures. The drawing application will allow greater fine-tuning of character features.

3. Inform 7

   I hope we are going to discuss this tool and have a lot of practice time, because I understand about a fourth of the Wikipedia entry. From what I can make out, Inform 7 is a tool used to make advanced interactive fiction programs. My brain is already hurting from reading a sample “source code”. My only interest in interactive fiction was that of last semester's class. I am an imaginative person, but I also like having descriptions and occasional pictures present in the text. Part of the appeal of the “Harry Potter Series” is that Rowling gives such a flowery description of the setting, but every person is free to piece together the descriptions as they see fit. Most interactive fiction samples that I have seen, those of Mechanisms read: you are standing in front of a house. But what kind of house? What does it look like? I don't want to be told outright what it looks like, but guided into a certain direction. Naturally, I could make the interactive game as I see fit, but it seems that part of these games' appeal is that they are blank slates for the player's imagination, and not the creator's.

4. CamStudio

   This tool could actually prove useful to me, as I am trying to start an Internet show with some friends back home. From the official website, I gather that I could animate the beginning segment to be played at the beginning of every show, sort of like a news logo. I cannot remember if this is the program that Dr. Jerz said can create a “Myst” like program with still images on the wall. If so, then I could use CamStudio to make a really cool honors presentation, sort of a virtual museum of my Paris pictures with captions about each place.

Blender 3-D and Inform 7 may seem overwhelming now, but I am sure that I will look back on my course samples at the end of the semester with the same kind of frustrated fondness that I now have for my EL 336 papers. Yes, there were parts of that class that I certainly enjoyed more that others, but all was worthwhile. The same shall go for El 405. I want to be able to work all 4 programs adequately; this is my overall goal for the class. My project goal is to either create a new flash animation parody or create the virtual museum. Either way, the research required for this goal statement has made me less apprehensive and more excited about this class. Yes, it is a means to an end, because I am not going to be pursuing a post-graduate career in new media. I am here for the writing. So my goal is essentially to have fun while creating a good product.

Kayla

Gopnik

"the internet was the first new medium to move decisively backward, for it is, essentially written" (180)

who hasn't spent a couple minutes every now and then reading through friends' facebook notes and myspace blogs?

Gopnik argues that email has made us more literate. Before that, he claims, most of our communication was through telephone calls and sparse handwritten letters. It helps us renew forgotten friendships; in a second, you can pull up contact information from the address book that can never be lost. But all we really want is to connect without intimacy; this is why the telephone and email succeeded, and the "videophone failed miserably" (181). Another medium, another intimacy mask.

Landow

"reading on a computer screen...lacks many of the pleasures offered by the printed book" (215)

Personally, there are too mnay distractiong icons and ads flashing around the text. They pull your eyes and attention away. I cannot read an article online either; I have to print it out, because the electronic copy does not allow you to highlight and make notations.

each form of physically recording a text has its peculiar strengths and weaknesses, to be sure. What, then, are those associated with the new digital technologies of cultural memory/' (217)

Let me just say that I wish I'd read this selection before turning in my paper last night. It's so relevant in all 3 categories. I also wish I'd readit before my midterm paper as well. I could have used the cultural changes section (2. Printed Books are technology, too). I cannot believe someone is so ignorant enough to say that "technology, particularly information technology, can never have cultural effects" (218). If there weren't any cultural changes, then waht did we just spend a semester learning about? What about the freeing of the mind? Rationalizing thought? 

 "These marks, which so obviously created a visible physical record of invisible sounds, provided a technology of cultural memory that, as Plato and many others since have pointed out, has had defining effects on human culture" (220)

oh my god. I am kicking myself for not having found this reading earlier. What a great quote for my midterm paper.

"the person who would preserve information in a manuscript age does so by preventing readers from having access to the text" (220)

and what a good argument against manuscript for my final paper. Now I'm getting kind of angry,

The materiality of the manuscript made it easily degradable. But I don't think it makes sense to throw out original copies when transferring to digital preservation. For public access's sake, I think digital transfer is essential; that way, the origianl document can be removed and preserved in the proper equipment to use when needed, which hopefully isn't often. But, just in case, it's there. It will still decay, but a whole lot slower. I have a battered copy of the Worthen Anthology of Drama that has pages falling out, tape all over the spine, and (yes, this is true) a squashed fly on the opening page of Fences. And I've only had the book since August. My copy of IANS (you all remember this from news writing) has been in my posession since the same time, but not used as often. I took care of both books. I don't dump my bag after each class. Normal wear and tear accidents happen over time; the pages in Worthen are Bible-print thin and very vulnerable. Would I read an electronic version? No. Only if I could print it out and mark it up; that way, I could have my copy and the reassurance that there was a backup I couldn't screw up.

"duplicating a manuscript requires that one expend an amount of time and energy similar to that expended in the creation of the text one wishes to copy" (221)

which can also lead to the wearing down of the paper, and the exhaustion of the human copier, which leaves the error/mistake gate wide open. For the sake of a more uniform content in distribution and durability of printing machines, the computer wins. But, "digital textuality also permits far greater ease of manipulability and reconfigurability" (221)-now that one applies right to one of my final paper arguments...!!!@!@!#

To sum up Landow, he writes a lot about what I did in my final paper, without mentioning Down and Out or 1984.

Sunstein

"The internet gives you the oppourtunity to meet other people who are interested in the same things you are, no matter how specialized, no matter who weird" (455)

would would have thought that the MUD's grandchild, the discussion board, would spawn political activist groups? The problem is that any nut can form a group or site. Are there any internet regulation rules? Becaue there's a lot of messed up stuff out there. Stuff like the Terrorist's Handbook is cause for government interference, from my point of view. There's filters out there, but nine are fool-proof. I remember once during 5th grade we were doing research when this one kid accidently (or not) pulled up porn. And this got past a filter that wouldn't even let you pull up your e-mail. 

Because the internet is faceless, people can experiement with thoughts without fear of being judged (sort of). It reminds me of that Simpsons episode where Bart creates the fake identity of Mrs. Krabopple's boyfriend with pictures and letters. Identity can be faked, so if people get angry and offended, you can pretend they are rejecting the "internet you", which may or may not be fake.

The separation and lack of interference from opposing groups allows these groups to segregate and remove themselves further from the mainstream. News blogs not regulated by the AP can be as biased and partisan as they like. People like being catered to, so the public is probably going to favour those who favour them.

The "information super-highway" is also a super highway for gossip. Any person with basic blogging skilles can post their thoughts on a subject as fact. chances are, no one will report them, if there is anyone to report them to. I guarantee you, if I posted a blog that said something like "robots eat oranges" and used some creative citing, eiditng, and composition, I could get people to believe it. 

 The rumor mill churns day and night with the internet. Because of the fact that anyone can publish, citing information found on a personal sight is not considered a reliable source for a paper.

Stormy

Since I said all I wanted to say about Lesser during my last presentation, here's a link to that entry: The Conversion

Johnson:

"a link is a way of drawing connections between things, a way of forging semantic relationships" (198)

This article would have been great to read alongside the Media Lab story. Web surfing is preferable because it usually links to more information on the same subject, whereas the television has a much more limited content. Links can take us far away from something that may not have been very helpful. Case in site: Wikipedia articles. While Wikipedia can be edited by anyone, the end of the page usually contains several links that can lead you to a place more reliable.

The story that the columnists for the NYT wrote on McCain would not have bee as biased if they had provided links to the past subjects they were now paraphrasing. Their paraphrasing is dangerous because it reminds people slightly of the past; they may not remember everything. The information provided may muddle together with a distant memory to form something that people may believe is truth.   

Afternoon is a brilliant example of what links can do to literature. A story that have countless links in it and changes constantly would never work in the television medium. People have become accustomed to the fast paced linearality of televised works. Afternoon, because it is a text, can be read at whatever pace the reader prefers. There is no rush to comprehend like when watching a play or tv show. But, Afternoon cannot be recorded and reviewed like the other two can. Only in the original viewing is this game best understood. 

 

 

 

*and that, my journalism friends, is my last blog of the year. My brain hurts from sitting at a computer since 1 pm*

au revoire, I'm going to be in Paris two weeks from the day

Here it is: my last portfolio for EL 336. Never before have I kad a more demanding class than this (except for general chemistry).  Even though I am only a sophmore, I put forth all of my effort because I knew that this class is my last one that really focused on writing. It was a chance to have my literary butt kicked and criticised. From this class, my writing has improved beyond what I thought it could. EL 336 stretched me to my breaking point frequently; I was often tense when handed in assigments. some of the material, mainly Aarseth and Kirschenbaum, was wuite difficult to comprehend and required closer readings. But it was all worth it. I look back on what I wrote as recent as last semester and the writing is barely recognizable. Thank you EL 336; I am glad to get rid of you, but I am glad that you taught me so much.

and Down and out in the Magic Kingdom was one of the most interesting books I have ever read.

Coverage/Timeliness: deadlines and content requirements met with all

The Trivialist in Me-many, many different thoughts on Aarseth

Bentham in the MUD-why Jeremy Bentham would have a problem with MUD's and chatrooms

The Conversion-Lesser's transition into digital communication

Kirschenbaum and Beckett-words are supposed to speak for themselves

The Stupidity of the Human Races mystifies me-the dangers of information publishing on the internet

100 and still grasping at straws-how a computer is like a timecapsule and if text games have distracting elements

Demon waves and little city-the computer has many operation going on all at once like a city; they all intertwine

traces of memory-on how Afternoon incorporates all the elements we love about reading a novel

another socratic slap...sort of-my final thoughts on Kirschenbaum, adressing permanence, ephemerality,and accuract of digital text

hitchhiker-gate-a huge ehtical issue regarding a piece of interactive fiction

needs, purposes, souls, and flight attendants-Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom and the dependence/need for preservation. What is memory?

I Kant believe what the world is coming to-parallels to "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind", why Pixar movies are faker than fake, and why Kant would hate the Bitchum society

Interactions:I triggered something in the minds of others

Bentham in the MUD

Kirshcenbaum and Beckett

The Conversion

Depth-essays

The Trivialist in Me

Bentham in the MUD

The Conversion

Kirschenbaum and Beckett

The Stupidity of the Human Races mystifies me

another socratic slap...sort of

Hitchhiker-gate

needs, purposes, souls, and flight attendants

I Kant believe what the world is coming to

Discussion: what others wrote, I followed up on

Chris-

A Well-Annotated Timeline

Racing Towards New Digital Solutions

Leslie-

Kirschenbaum 3 agenda item

Rachel-

Baio blog response

Doctorow 82-206

David-

Hitchhiker

Kirshenbaum (end)

Doctorow-The Beginning

Kayla-

Kirshcenbaum (finish)

Doctorow-82-206

Jeremy-

Kirschenbaum-Text Messaging

 

 

Doctorow 81-end

*purposely leaving the big part about Julius' malfunctioning memory out of this blog, for that will be added into my research paper*

 "live -headed flight from Toronto" (92)

even little details like this are disturbing. For God's sake, people knock themselves out over sheer boredom. Guess it's a way to fast-forward through the mundane parts of life.

"there wasn't a single bit of tech more advanced than a film loop projector in the whole place"

Have any of you ever been to the Haunted Mansion? There are mechanical arms moving doors and coffin covers open, visible strings suspending spiders, obvious heads hidden behind gravestones, and other creaking mechanisms. All the visible elements of production make the ride even that more effective. the scariest part of the mansion is the graveyard because I know the heads are going to pop up and I have to sit there and wait. It seem that in futuristic Disney World, the more high tech something becomes, so does it become more uninteresting and sterile.

Speaking of uninteresting, who else is bothered by those Pixar movies? Yes, it's great that the audience can now see the details of a drop of water on a blade of grass, but there is something to be said about the process. Long gone are the days of animators sitting at desks drawing cell by cell renderings of characters. Pixar movies are meant to make the world seem more realistic, but the world they create is faker than fake. The 3-Dness, for me, makes the movie seem more fake than a traditionally animated one.

"there wasn't a shred of recognition in them. She'd never met me" (118)

In an "Eternal Sunshine"-esque tactic, Zed had edited her memory and removed every though of Julius. While I understand the appeal of removing pain caused by a breakup (oh, it's been a bad week, trust me), I would never want to erase my ex from my memory. People come and go out of our lives, but I believe their imprints on our minds enrich us in the long run. We learn different things from different people. I am a better person for having known him and would never want to cut him out of my life or memory. No matter how much it hurts. There's something very wrong and abnormal about having memories of only good times. But values have changed since what would be considered our present-day.

"why bother with surgery when you can grow a clone" (128)

And while you're at it, why bother erasing your pencil marks when you can just get a new page? This is blatant waste, but in this world bodies are expendable. Julius' condition is evidence that nothing can be perfect, and there will always be a need for somebody, however small, to be able to fix it. Unfortuntely, due to his low Whuffie, Julius is not considered important enough to devote time to.

"he presented me with a clever little handheld...it had much of the functionality of my defunct systems" (164)

I believe what Julius is talking about is either a PDA (are they connected to the internet) or an i-phone type device. In our times, they are an extension of the brain, but in this future devices like the PDA and i-phone would be considered prototypes of the brain.

"plan a murder, kill yourself, have yourself refreshed from a backup made before the plan" (196)

What a "perfect crime". If you have no memory of the incident, you are technically "innocent". Hope to go this never happens; the polygraph test, while not yet perfected, would be rendered useless. Something like this would be an invitation to criminals. I am reminded of Kant's philosophy. He states that every action should be weighed as a maxim, which means you have to think about if your action would be able to be repated by everyone. If not, the action is immoral. Kant calls this the "universal law" test. 

 

Doctorow

"deadheading"-10

This is actually a word used in the flight attendant industry. Deadheading refers to when an attendant does not work a section of the flight (either coming or going) and sits like a passenger. I wonder if Doctorow saw the connection or arbitrarily chose the word. Regardless, deadheading in "Down and Out" is an exaggeration of the actual meaning.

"we can't remember what it was like to ear our keep; to worry that there might not be enough, that we might get sick or hit by a bus. We don't remember what it was like to take chances, and we sure as shit don't remember what it felt like to have them pay off" (11)

Humans need to feel. They need to contribute to society. That is what our unalienable right are all about: to allow participation in society. regardless of the need to work, it is a human instinct to do something worthwhile with your life. Royals don't need to work, but they are always holding fundrasiers and forming charities because they have a natural need for human fellowship. We need to feel something, even if it is pain. At least we feel it.

"you think you're going to be anything recognizably human in a hundred centuries" (12)

"I've seen about enough, and that'll be my last day" (12)

"There'll come a day when I don't have anything left to do, except stop" (13)

Humans were not meant to live forever. Eternal existence would have severe psychological effects on a person. A cure for death sounds good, but what reason does a person have to live forever? Each time the person is re-generated and re-born, they lose a little bit of themselves eacg time. Bodily features are different, and memory is altered. What will be the affect of a thousand deaths? Will anything be left over? What will be our purpose for going on and on...

"it was climbing steadily upward as he accumulated more esteem" (13)

I love the satire Doctorow writes. That is the real reason for acculmulation of money, isn't it? It is a symbol of approval. The poor are looked down upon and the rich are looked up to. Nice metaphor. Whuffie forces a person to confrom to society. If you don't act a certain way, your riches will decrease. It's a inadvertant sociological control device.

While the book is a little disturbing, Doctorow made some valid points. "everyone who had serious philosophical conundra on that subject list, you know, died, a generation before." (32). There was no need to fight against an opposition because they would fade in time. The Bitchums just had to wait; the circumstances would give them free reign.

"But you're not really an atom-for-atom copy. You're a clone, with a copied brain-that's not the same" (42)

Like I said earlier, there is something lost with every death. Is a soul something unique to the body, or can it be transferred? Memories alone do not constitute someone's character and personality. Animals have memories, but do they have souls? Many would say not. So what is the soul then?

*I have deliberately left out all the parts about memory. I will be saving them for my paper*

 

"One person I talked to said, "When it sells 20,000 copies we'll finally be rid of Douglas Adams." That may be a little cynical. However, let's look at the alternatives.One person I talked to said, "When it sells 20,000 copies we'll finally be rid of Douglas Adams." That may be a little cynical. However, let's look at the alternatives."

Baio

okay, first of all, I am pretty sure that trying to get rid of the author of the storyline would not be something anyone would like to admit or be proud of. So let's examine the ethical questions Dr Jerz posted on his blog:

1. Can a blogger be a journalist?  Is this particular blogger a journalist? Who decides?

I don't think that he is a journalist. I have been taught that a journalist must always have permission from his sources to publish what they said. Otherwise, the writer can be sued. The first ammendment does not protect you from lawsuits; it just protects your right to free speech, not the reprocussions. A journalist must decide whether it is worthwhile to publish information that may get him to trouble. I'm anxious to find out of the writers of those emails have discovered Baio's little discovery.

How important was the information on the disk anyway? To be, it would be like someone discovering an 8th Harry Potter book. Sure, its interesting, but I can certainly live without it. The secret tapes in Watergate were a whole lot more important than a disk containing unreleased information about a game. What if Baio gets sued? Was it really worth it? He must care a lot about interactive fiction games....

Is it journalism if it relies wholly on archival material?

No. He didn't do any work or reporting. Someone handed him the material. That didn't mean he had to publish it. Is the world really a better place now that Baio released the secret emails? It would have been journalism if Baio would have then questioned the people involved. i don't really think that this counts as investigative reporting. I also met Mika' husband at the funeral last July. He helped break the story about the soldier abuse in Iraq. That was investigative journalism.

Is it reliable journalism if it depends on anonymous sources (in this case, the unnamed source who provided the author with the Infocom archives)?

You have to use your judgement. Deep Throat turned out to provide the reporters with valuable information. But probably not everyone will be as truthful. For all the reader could know, the source could be fictional. That is why when US Magazine says, "A source told the magazine that Beyonce and Jay-Z....." is not good journalism. "Anonymous" source could also be a way for the reporter to insert his own opinion into the story, which is also against established journalistic rules.

Is it journalism there is no editorial oversight -- nobody to say "Woah, there, are you sure you should be publishing the full text of e-mails that were sent from one private individual to another?"

The editor is supposed to catch mistakes and information that could get the writer and rest of the staff in trouble. I've caught quotes that would not be allowed in the Setonian. The editor acts like a filter. In a paper, the editor has final say, but I don't really know about freelace authors...

Was the information pressing enough, or of sufficient news value, to justify a "publish first and ask questions later" attitude?

 NO. Not really. How much of an interest to people is this subject? They are probably not in the minority. How much is this information going to positively or negatively affect people's lives?

Is it journalism if the author offers to de-publish text that the original authors don't want published?

I don't really know if that would be an option. There is such a thing as a retraction, but someone can never be un-published. Someone, somewhere has probably already copied the document. De-publishing would not eliminate distribution of the material. I refer to my HS Chorus teacher's scandal. He unpublished the documents, but someone had already made a copy and distributed them to faculty and students, past and present. You can never be certain that somebody does not have a copy. Never publish anything you wouldn't want everyone to see.

What opportunity for insight and subtlety was lost when the author chose to publish without checking with the sources?

Clarification. Perhaps there is more to the story. Maybe all of the people mentioned in the emails made peace with each other. Baio has only "reported" part of the story. He has painted people as villians who may not be that at all.

Kirschenbaum 4

"but whay do we mean when we talk about transmitting-sending and receving a written text? and what are we to make of words like error, corruption, purity, and verification, all of which are also conspucuous in the language of textual criticism" (215)

"the essence of his expression, and others, such in general as spelling, punctuation, word-division, and the like, affecting mainly its formal presentation" (215)

So the words themselves, disregarding all these other elements, are not all that is communicated. I guess this is the reason why hadwritten manuscripts are so valuable: they are more able to contain the writer's essence than plain print. The omissions, crossings-out, and notes in the margins have value as well.

"Agrippa reminds us that preservation is ultimately a social demain, where actions and agency can serve to trump purely technical considerations" (218)

The preservation occurs due to how much the readers value the content. The readers obviously valued Agrippa so much that they felt everyone should be able to read it. Due to its design, this was more of a challenge than traditionaly copying.

"they were priced at $450, $1,500, and $7,500 respectively" (222)

maybe people fogured that the price was so high because the work had major artistic value. Therefore, interest was peaked.

"hacking and cracking...these activites do not need to involve a computer" (226)

I am reminded of a story where a man was in a jail cell and was trying to break out. He found rocks on the bottom of the cell and bits of metal in the wall to try and hack away at the cell door, but all of his crude tools broke and crumbled. The man spent many hours in vain, becuase the door was unlocked the whole time. The point: overthinking is not always the best solution. Simple may be the key. I record interviews all the time instead of taking notes. It's just a better assurance of accuracy. No knowledge of code needed.

"and it wound up being this permanent gohstly presence on the internet, which I couldn't erase if I wanted to...there is no place to go and pull the plug on this thing. It sort of lives there. So it worked out really well" (228)

By the transcription of the poem to the internet, there was no esacpe. There was no chance that Gibson would forget what he had written. But that was a good thing, considering the content of the work. Memory is faulty; I imagine Gibson would not want to forget his father. Maybe subconsciously he wanted the poem to be hacked; "this was a 'planned progression' of his work" (227)

"text which were not translated into the new medium almost always perished, because they had become unintelligible to the textual classes" (236)

could this mean that a future generation may not be able to read books because they don't know how?  

Kirschenbaum 4

"has been exposed to a wide range of editorial interventions and authorial revisions in the oucrse of its relatively brief publishing" (161)

how ironic then, is it that Afternoon was meant to be a text that changes?

"But too often the reader comes upon a new hallway not previously explored or finds a previoudly locked door giving way to the touch" (165)

I know I've read books where the next time I read them, a statue or door comes through in the next that I didn't notice there before. Afternoon, it seems, makes use of all those objects that, on the first time through, you may think of as just background. (I am seriously resisting an urge to mention the room of requirement in HP).
If you pay close enough attention, you might have one of those "oh yeah" moments where you see how one little object or alteration can change the entire story, while at the same time keeing some of the origial elements. All those background characters you meet might somehow fit into the story; all characters in a story are there for a reason, and afternoon (by my understanding) more than makes use of the oppourtunity for intertwining stories.

"stacking cells inside other cells indicates hierarchical relationships, while drawing and labeling lines from one another indicates associate links. The author may then use the created structure to control or review the presentation of the text" (172)

So the author has control over how the reader reads his work. Maybe the links are arranged so that each time the reader plays, he will see more and more how connected these sidesteps are. The room or requirement in Harry Potter was mentioned in the first book, but didn't enter the storyline until the 5th book. But Rowling mentioned it for a reason, maybe meaning to let us wonder about it. My point is, everything that an author puts into the story, even the description of a plant, is significant and important. You just might not understand to what degree when reading traditional texts.

"But I swear to God it reads like an entirely different series of stories. It really jumps to life right now from the first foray into the text" (184)

This quote sums up my point about Joyce. One little tweak, and the entire story (or a person's perception of it) changes.

"additionally, users of Netscape Navigator should turn link underlining off" (193)
"the original...did not show it links" (193)

So maybe what Joyce meant by not underlining the links is that the author was meant to discover them on his own. The story progresses differently according to the reader's interest. someone who is not paying enough attention may not notice n unlocked door or an overturned pot.

"an electrnic document is literally created anew each time it is accesses, symbolically and procedurally reconstituted from the analog bit representations recorded by storage media" (203)

This quote reminds me of something we talked about in Form and Analysis while reading "The Empty Space". Brook argues that emotional memory is not a good tool to use for actors because there is really no original memory. There is no new process within the person, nothing created. We only remember what happened the last time we remembered. Each time, more and more of the origial fades. Our minds act like computers, reconstituting a "memory" from the representations (that is literally what they are) our brain has recorded. It has been proven that memory can be erased and surpressed, and can be recovered, just like recovering a document. This is actually one of the few things Brook said that actually made sense to me.

"date and time stamps that certify (to the second) the moment of the object's local creation, the last time it was modified and the last time it was accessed" (204)

And thank god this happens. have you ever gone to save a document and cannot find it again. I have saved countless papers in a pinch, and the default setting is always the first couple of wordse of the paper. Unfortunately, they are usually my name. I have about 10 documents under the same file name, but each one was created on a different date.