Emerging communication technologies remediate and redefine relations between reader and author, but a comprehensive progressive framework for assessing this dynamic during the process of preparation, transmission, reception, and consumption of media remains elusive. Such a framework is of consequence for hypertext (and first generation electronic literature in particular). Speculative claims for its utility and equally reductive rejections of the reading experience it offers call for a model which assesses the calibration of the reader/author relationship from within the medium itself. This paper presents a first framework for assessing these dynamics both at the stage of authoring and reading. Within this analysis framework we identify eleven remediating factors conceived as scales between opposing tensions, and implement this model with reference to first generation electronic literature.

CCS Concepts: Human-centered computing; Human computer interaction (HCI); Interaction paradigms; Hypertext / hypermedia

Keywords: Author-Reader Interaction, Hypertext, Collaborative Technologies, Media Experience

This paper focuses on medium as defining the conditions under which authors and readers negotiate their relationship. This recentering of the medium as the object of research is motivated by the proliferation of new solutions, and disintegration of content standards, precipitated by the digital revolution. The stability afforded by the domination of certain historically located media – the book, the canvas, the record – is eroded by the proliferation of digital technologies whose impact remains in many cases underdetermined. Technologies like hypertext reinvigorated practices more often associated with the pre-industrial era – collective reading, collaborative annotation, patronage. Equally the production processes and workflow that underpin the generation, distribution, and consumption of content is insufficiently addressed by existing practices.

We propose a new framework for evaluating the author/reader dual-relation that seeks to fully address the mediation of their relationship by content technologies. Specifically, this new paradigm proposes an alternative view of this power balance -as a “geometry” defined by a set of technology features which in turn restructure a related set of dynamic dimensions.

A central challenge for any intermedial, interdisciplinary framework, however, is the aporia of accomodating affordances from different textualities under one epistemic umbrella. Attempts to contrast network textuality with linear print, for example, is a favoured target of early hypertext critics [1,2] and this disaggregation of digital technologies is a project shared for example by John Cayley. Any attempt to universalise the experience of reading inevitably risks appearing essentialist, even reductive of these very different experiences. Models of communication have, however, historically circulated around two agents and the means of communication bridging them: see Michael J. Toolan’s teller/tale/addressee [3]; Claude Shannon’s sender/channel/receiver [4]; Computer Science’s user/software/programmer; literature’s author/text/reader. While each term is deeply historicised (from which this paper has already adopted the author, reader, text approach widely used in the humanities) there is general recognition of a fundamental asymmetry between these two agents. An author inscribes an intended meaning into a particular medium; the reader interprets this material from their own perspective. Reader-response theorist Wolfgang Iser describes this separation of authorial intent and individual interpretation as being two equally valid polarities [5], in keeping with Jakki Spicer’s conclusion that the 20th century had on balance “jettisoned the notion of authorial intention as a primary focus in the interpretation of a text’s meaning” [6].

Definitions of reader and author are in a constant state of flux, a lasting consequence of poststructuralist undoings. Our refocussing on technology (defined as a temporary concretisation of a particular set of technological variables) allows reader and author to be defined from within the context created by this specific configuration. In the interests of expediency we might also reference Derrida in placing these terms sous rature [7], since they are so loaded yet essential that we must simply strike them through and move on, or Marie Laure Ryan’s observation that if we redefine such terms too broadly we will “need a new word for retrieving words from one’s mind to encode meanings, and the difference with reading will remain” [8]. Our goal is not to define the reader, but to define the reader created by this particular configuration, though a fuller exploration of historical reader relations would provide opportunities for future work. The computer as reading agent (as in distant reading) represents a potentially interesting avenue for future exploration, though arguably this represents a supplementary knowledge circuit which still places the human interpreter in the position of reader.

An asymmetrical relationship (as between reader and author) should not be seen as intrinsically antagonistic. As literary theorist Bo Eklund suggests “literary authority, like any other form of authority, exists only when it is recognized” [9]; it is the reader who consents to willing subordination, fitting themselves to the idiosyncratic material limitations of the medium in question. Whether one entity or many, lean-forward or lean-back, we can generally identify the three components that make up the communicative act. As Janet Murray notes, we must “distinguish derivative authorship from the originating authorship of the system itself” [10]. A driver is not a mechanic; a photographer is not a chemist. Absent the most purely collaborative project, in which both agents engage in real time using identical tools, an asymmetry between author and reader will naturally emerge.

Here, as elsewhere, we differentiate between the categories of author/reader/text and specific iterations thereof. Author should not be read as synonymous with writer, which carries an enlightenment valorisation of the individual at odds with the collaborative activities of software development (not to mention filmmaking or audiobook recording). Equally text should not be identified with any specific medium or reader with an individual – interpretative community might be considered equally valid as a referrant. Philosopher and critic Michel Foucault once argued that author should be redefined to be “equivalent of one, or a series, of definite descriptions” [11], which acknowledges the reader’s instinct to ascribe intentionality to a text without defining what or whom that author may be. Readers will inevitably ascribe motivation to choices made in the development of even the most profoundly collaborative project: as philosopher Alexander Nehamas puts it, “no reading can fail to generate an author” [12] -however you understand this term.

This contribution, however, focuses on the mediator which defines the terms of exchange between reader and author. Transmission between author and reader requires a set of “intersubjectively verifiable instructions for meaning- production” [13], which is to say an arrangement of common symbols organized according to rules understood by both parties; put simply, a medium. Professor of Information Paul Duguid rightly cautions us that it is “important to think not idealistically about information, but materially” [14], while poststructuralist critic Roland Barthes stated that it would be “useless to attempt a material separation” between the work and its interpretation [15]. Representation of thought as audiobook, television series, or novel represents a decision which will naturally result in the elision or privileging of certain material. This notion is perhaps better articulated by Oliver Postman’s argument that first and foremost “form excludes content” [16]. This is to say that the medium by which content is constructed and conveyed configures the material affordances of that content. While this argument may seem essentialist, it is perhaps better understood as a pragmatic approach to the potential and limitation of respective media.

Decisions taken at a software level should be considered instrumental in generating a particular experience, since it is these decisions that will determine the relationship the reader will have with the content. This notion -understanding software as an authorial element with whom the reader engages in dialogue -is well established [17-19] but a suitably wide-ranging framework has proven elusive.

2.1 The Study of Creative Work and Reading

2.2 Non-Neutrality of Technology

2.3 Non-Neutrality of Technology

Evaluation of this process can be undertaken from two perspectives (see Figure 1): action to response, in which the study focuses on how actors act in their socio-cultural- technological environment and which reaction they cause, e.g. response at an individual scale and reception at a broader scale from the other actors; 2) respose to action, the study of how the current socio-cultural-technological environment foster, mediate, and influence the actions of the different actors.

Figure 1: Action/Response and Response/Action perspective in studying content technologies, concerning the mediation of: Work, Manifestation, Expression and Item (IFLA, 2013).

To illustrate this approach, we might consider the hypertext paradigm, which is an emblematic example of how content technologies can be addressed either from the author and the reader viewpoint, and from one of these two perspectives.

Firstly, we might assess hypertext as an authoring technology. In this regard, hypertext permits authors to control the structural component of the content (from hidden to explicit), and reading flow through the design or selection of a system of intertextual connections between lexia. From an action-to-response perspective, then, the study might emphasise how author choices and use of hypertext influences the reading experience and the type of reading (e.g. skimming or deep reading, pathways between lexia).

Conversely, we might consider hypertext as a reader technology. In this regard, hypertext frees the reading experience from fixed linear structures, providing intuitive representation and control over conceptual interconnections during the process of interaction. From a response-to-action perspective, the reader reacts to the presence of intertextual elements, thereby developing new practices and exercising agency over the use of both text and paratext, shaping her experience in modalities not envisaged by the author.

Note 1. The editor function, it should be noted, can be located within either the reader or author function, dependent on whether it establishes the initial conditions of engagement or subsequent operations under these conditions.

It should be clear that assessment either from an action-response or response-action perspective is not exclusive -it is possible to assess this technology from both directions and achieve compatible if contradictory results. It is as possible for a technology to impose problematic or constraining conditions on both authors and readers, or to valorise both. Balance of power is not equilibrium, and empowerment of one agent does not necessarily require disempowerment of another. A framework of content technology should therefore support an understanding of the connection between design choices and a variety of outcomes, harmonious or otherwise. By way of illustration, we may consider critical research into social media “stalking”, and the relation between authors and readers on web-comics platforms. In the former case we find social media as a content technology creating a condition of conflict between author and reader whilst also acting detrimentally to both [35]; in the latter, as evidenced by Benatti’s work [36], we find a platform acting as enabler for the formation and emergence of new authors and creative content -supported by a fruitful engagement between authors and readers.

Mode of expression in each case carries the potential to act deterministically, mediating the dialogue between author and reader across temporal, cultural, and spatial gaps. From this perspective, we question how content technology configure this connection in terms of managing the input of different actors, their engagement through its output, and how it realises the conversion or translation between the instances of the different actors (throughput), see Figure 2.

Figure 2: Input, Output and Throughput connections mediated by content technology.

The impact of this technology-mediated connection is the principle target of our proposed framework.

This contribution provides a first framework for describing how technology re-mediates the author/reader relation. This framework provides a comprehensive (but not exhaustive) list of re-mediating factors described as scales between two opposite tensions. These scales are then used to analyse three different types of content technologies at the scale of system, media and feature. These indicative use cases consider the impact of the input, output, and throughput of a content technology on the phases on preparation, activity, and outcome, as identified by the presented integrative frameworks.

The following represents a limited number of dimensions within which technology operates to mediate the relationship between authors and readers (see Figure 3). As identified above this is not a comprehensive list, but one with a suitable level of interoperability between media:

Structure / Content, enhancing, changing or customising the structure or to improve, specify, deepen the content sense-making

Replicable / Unique, results in a replicable, sharable condition or configures a unique situation

Self-contained / Linked, supports the creation of self-contained contents or supports interconnectivity and interdependency with external sources

Ambiguous / Explicit, permits ambiguity and gaps (to be filled by other actors) or supports and encourages the addressing of ambiguities

Delegation / Control, supports devolving responsibilities and activities toward other parties or exerts control over activities and responsibilities more commonly addressed by other actors

Actionable / Reflective, oriented toward action and change or reflection and analysis

Legible / Invisible, foregrounds the nature of the interaction or hides steps and actors

Structured / Unstructured, provides a structured interaction or facilitates a more fluid configuration

Synchronous / Asynchronous, supports or fosters synchronous or asynchronous interactions between actors

On site / Displaced, supports or fosters interactions between actors sharing the same physical location or otherwise displaced across multiple locations

Mono-modal / Multi-modal, supports or fosters a single-or multiple genre of interaction

Mono-platform / Multi-platform, supports or fosters interactions between actors sharing a same digital location (platforms) or displaced across multiple platforms The unique calibration of these factors is generative of specific author/reader dynamics. Furthermore, as mentioned, a technology can have a variety of effects on both reader and author which could be better understood and analysed in terms of its unique calibration, and resonances between these factors.

The impact of content technology on the reader-author relation is to create circumstances consistent with (or contrary to) the needs and desires of these actors. Addressing the broad complexity and deepness of technology adoption are goals of several fields of research and therefore out of scope of this work’s scope. Furthermore, a technology has to be assessed within a specific applicative scenario and setting, as a failure or success are to be expressed in relation to a specific goal.

On the other hand, as discussed in section 2.1, the relation between agent and technology concerns at least:

The preparation for reading, how expectations and needs are addressed by a technology and barriers and issues concerning its introduction in a socio-technological context

The activity of reading, interaction between users and technology, the legibility of the system of how it operates, and the output produced and the embodiment in the users’ environment

The post reading, does the use of technology lead to positive or negative effects In this view, as discussed in section 2.3, a specific signature (the design choices) configures a baseline for adoption, user experience and impact concerning:

Input, the response of the user by the technology

Output, the response of the technology by the user

Throughput, translation of user-to-user effects of technology

Furthermore, it is worthwhile to highlight that the success of new technology is rare and the result of long-term processes of refinement and evolution: the precondition of success is the lack of critical errors.

Table 1: Pre-assessment matrix.

Therefore, we propose a pre-assessment matrix for the analysis of inconsistencies in technology profiles that could result in issues or failure of the author / reader interactions (see Table 1).

It is important to highlight, that the instantiation of the framework and the pre-assessment has to be done for each actor. Indeed, inconsistencies and, therefore, friction can be traced back to the misalignment between the design choices of input and output, among the different actors.

In this section, we apply the framework and assessment matrix to analyse and discuss first generation electronic literature. Through this example, we aim to showcase the benefit of reframing content technologies in general (and first generation electronic literature specifically) by addressing technology as a remediation of the space where authors and readers interact.

The identification of a narrow object of study is intentional. This case study seeks primarily to assess the utility of our model. It does not seek to accommodate all nuances of hypertext as a medium, which is beyond the scope of this paper and will be developed when seeking edge cases or areas where this model does not apply. When demonstrating a model, it is sometimes necessary to ground it in a representative example, rather than fully interrogating edge cases. Demonstrating a model for literature would not seek to seek the most experimental or modernist variations on the form, for example, but the most representative. First generation electronic literature presents a useful object of study, as the forensic critical examination of its perhaps slim corpus provides scholarly familiarity as our unfamiliar model is explored. By way of definition we may turn to Leonardo Flores, who summarises the ELO’s N. Katherine Hayles’ definition of first generation electronic literature as “pre-web, text-heavy, link driven, mostly hypertext, that still operated with many paradigms established in print” [37]. While possible, expanding this definition to accommodate works of the second generation – which Flores considers ongoing – or protohypertext works would be to undermine the advantage of focussing on a form which has such clear material and historical boundaries, though one would anticipate resonances as one moves to such parallel intellectual projects.

5.1 Critics of First Generation Electronic Literature

5.2 Analysis of First Generation Electronic Literature

5.3 Discussion

In Bolter and Grusin’s Remediation the authors describe the double logic of remediation: that our culture “wants both to multiply its media and to erase all traces of mediation” [42]. This paradoxical desire to be both immediate and to celebrate medium as novelty necessitates a model that reflects more soberly on the consequences of the act of mediation. “Hypertext did not result in the revolution in authoring practices, the decentering of authority, or the empowerment of the reader that had been projected” argues Kathleen Fitzpatrick [43]. Too often discussions of first generation electronic literature likewise emphasises its failings, as if the unique affordances and properties of the medium were inadequate for some undefined, abstract ambition to which all media should supposedly aspire. To criticise first generation electronic literature for what it cannot do is to reject a hammer for breaking your coffee mug when used as a spoon. The value of the framework presented on the preceding pages is to identify the unique calibration of a particular medium, in this case hypertext; this is not done in the spirit of denigration or valorisation, but to foreground the unique affordances which might yet be tapped. If first generation electronic literature paradigm is to be rehabilitated for “mainstream consciousness” [44] then we should recognise it for what it is, not what it fails to be, and discuss it in those terms both with authors and readers.

More widely, the preceding model seeks to make visible the intrinsic features of media not in the spirit of celebration, but of reflection. It is the authors’ opinion that a revised paradigm and a specific framework about content technology is necessary for opening a discussion about the impact of technology, addressing wide-ranging issues as the socio-technological position on editorial systems, the impact of micro-advertisement on the publishing workflow, tailored advertising and content aggregation, and so on. These concerns are frequently and widely discussed in isolation, but a comprehensive model accommodating these factors provides an opportunity to see them in a new context.

This approach refocuses evaluation from an inductive to a deductive mode. Rather than extrapolating from specific technological cases toward general conclusions, this model allows general principles to be used in the assessment of specific cases. This approach lends itself to integration into the developmental workflow of new technological solutions, as it is not necessary for the technology to exist before assessing its potential advantages. For instance, in “Making Design Theory” [45], Redström outlines several roles of theories and theoretical frameworks in the pre-use stages of a design process. Indeed, pre-assessment of new solutions allows for reflection and conscious assessment of the developmental direction prior to full-scale development, and of the potential needs in relation to ethics assessment and user testing.

Framework development opportunities are of three types: firstly, whether the binaries identified represent genuine oppositions; secondly, whether these binaries are exhaustive; thirdly, how robustly this model can accommodate new and emerging technologies. The first will be the subject of the next development phase, in which small groups will be asked to map existing technologies to these binaries and assess their applicability. The second is not a claim made by this paper, and it is hoped that the community can assist in the development of other oppositions of consequence to the reader/author relationship – particularly as expressed within hypertext. Exposure to the humanities community is likely to yield additional commentary and criticism, which the authors welcome. The third represents an opportunity, but in foregrounding the dynamics of the reader-author relationship -one as old, perhaps, as communication itself -it is hoped that this model will be of continued utility. A systematic and comparable analysis of emerging technologies will form an additional component of this future work.

This work was partially supported by Reading Europe – Advanced Data Investigation Tool (READ-IT), a project funded by the JPI Cultural Heritage under the European Union Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation programme (grant agreement No 699523).

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