Week 6—Electronic Literature

For the sake of OCD continuity, I have decided to re-post some additional thoughts based around the re-scheduled week 4 topic on Hypertext here in week 6. For the original ‘volitional’ week 4 discussion see my blog-post titled Week4—Hypertext.

Varying forms of literature have existed since time immemorial. What seems apparent from the outset is how literature has kept pace relative to its respective technological period in time. Arguably, the consumption of material consumed by the masses is generally proportionate to the level of technology. Ancient Rome used clay tablets as a type of gazette for the purpose of public announcements; Monks in the Middle Ages used various animal skins as a medium to record and archive information, to the invention of Gutenberg’s printing press that saw a proliferation of printed novels. In times that are more recent, we see the introduction and mass uptake of computers enabling literature to metamorphose into a digital format. Collectively this equates to an amount of information that is truly vast.

This plethora of information has generated the need for order, which has taken on a new meaning: How do you find what you are looking for? Maybe not so much today, but at one time in the not too distant past the solution to addressing this issue was to visit a library; but not all libraries were the same, a school library, for example, would unlikely contain the expanded works that a major city library would, and so on. Often, just the thought of going to a library triggered an internal sentience of personal affectation—perhaps albeit unconsciously—due to an acceptance that going to a library was indeed sage, and by doing so, it would yield answers to questions hitherto unknown. Once in the library the key to any successful investigation was in knowing how to use the library catalogue—often a mystery in itself! However, if all else failed a person could always enlist the expertise of the librarian. Men, arguably though, do not like asking for help because of the size of their egos, the bigger the ego the fewer the requests. They also have an inflated sense of direction, which they often refer to as a built-in road map.

Putting mapping into practice might work on a small or medium scale, but the amount of information that exists in the world today could conceivably surpass many libraries stacked end to end; and without knowing exactly how much information is out there, arguably it is bordering on the infinite. As much as some may hate to admit it these days the humble library catalogue is simply not up to the challenge, not to mention the logistics to access it all, although it would at least give a good reason to buy one of those self-balancing electric scooters. However, not all that matters now because there is something to take its place: Welcome to the age of the networked-database. Whether we like it or not, storage devices are growing exponentially with every passing year and in numbers that do not seem to be abating anytime soon. So how does anyone find what he or she is looking for?

The term Google is so ubiquitous these days it takes on more than just the name of an I.T. company. So much so is the impact of Google it now resides under the Oxford online dictionary as a verb (Oxford Learners Dictionaries, 2020). There are other words, however, that came along before the advent of Google which can help find whatever it is we are searching for in the expansive void of collected information. One word in particular has been around long before IBM made computers compatible, or Steve Jobs capitalised on selling as many Apple 1s with his inimitable business acumen; a word which dates back even further than when CSIRAC was but a glint in its creator’s eye; it was a term that early seafaring crusaders knew the meaning of all too well. The word is Navigation. This is what we need to find the information we seek, and to clarify this point using academic rhetoric: ‘Navigation can therefore serve as an entry point for meta-critical inquiry into the ways in which we read, think, and interpret information through media-specific ways’ (Pressman, 2008).

There is no doubt that a ship is guided on its voyage across the seas by navigating a course; it also needs involvement from a person at its helm.  This is also true of a database that is incomplete without input from an operator or user. Employing our nautical analogy to further use, with the size of oceans so vast that being in the middle of one means that land is not visible in any direction, it is no wonder that navigation plays a key role in a ship finding its way, safely. But if we factor in other elements, such as tumultuous weather with waves so big they appear as multi-story buildings crashing across a ship’s bow, it quickly becomes a prime concern for all onboard how well the ship is constructed. The same can be said when going online, which is often a challenge when it comes to finding what it is we want as the information dips below the waves of online surfing. However, short of cyclonic disasters which computers sometimes bring out in the best of us, if practised properly by coders, our savior should be right alongside the hypertext with our interactions. These are the new catalogues, with librarians replaced by database engineers, and webmasters who stack the digital-shelves, all of whom contribute to making the process of navigating the digital world easier, safer and far more rewarding.

Unexpected events are part of any journey, and the digital world is by no means an exception. Unwary users may end up down a wrong path ending up mired in so much information they forget the reason behind the purpose they started out trying to achieve. Or maybe they come across something that just a few clicks back was barely visible and didn’t really look that big a problem, until all of a sudden it pops-up out of nowhere announcing an exigency of monumental importance threatening to halt all further progress. At this point it usually pays to give the antivirus program permission to update its database, turn off your monitor, or close the laptop, and head to the kitchen to put the kettle on.

Works Cited

Oxford Learners Dictionaries. (2020, April 15). Retrieved from https://www.oxfordlearnersdictionaries.com/definition/english/google

Pressman, J. (2008). Navigating Electronic Literature. Retrieved from Jessica Pressman: https://www.jessicapressman.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/Pressman_revised__final.pdf