hypertext

The founders of automated computing systems considered hypertext a basic component of the efficient navigation of massive information systems. Hypertext, most simply, is the presentation of information in a non-linear form. Conceptually, hypertext is a method of thought that could be applied to a variety of media; practically, though, hypertext is still confined to the electronic realm. As hypertext use is expanding with the growing World Wide Web, it is gaining universal acceptance as a usable electronic medium with a dramatic effect on the experiences of reading and writing.

In the past five years, electronic writing has also been revolutionized by the advent of weblogs. As a new form of writing that opens web publishing to a general writing public, weblogs have popularized freedom of expression with the same speed that Napster popularized free music. By distorting the boundaries between the reader and writer, the fixed and non-fixed text, and the spatial and sequential relation between the text and other texts, hypertext is dramatically changing the experience of reading and