blog about blogs: week four

Damnnn Indi! Back at it again with those inception blogs about blogging…

This weeks topic of Hypertext initially had me a little confused, as the reading by George P Landow, was so dense (I will be writing a blog about this soon and will link it here). But after speaking to my Networked Media clan, I have gained more clarity on the idea of Hypertext .

So in order to gain full clarity/ 20/20 hypertext vision, I shall give you a little insight into the wonderful world of hypertext…

After I did the reading, and had a few ideas of what hypertext actually was, I turned to my trusty friend google to gain some clarity via definitions…

The first definition I came across was thanks to Merriam-Webster:

“a database format in which information related to that on a display can be accessed directly from the display”

I then turned to Dictionary.com for further clarification…

“computer software and hardware that allows users to create, store,and view text and move between related items easily and in anonsequential way; a word or phrase can be selected to link users to another part of the same document or to a different document”

And now all those little bursts of insight I gained from the reading were glued together in my mind. Hypertext is not only the basis for the WWW (World Wide Web) as a whole, but encompasses the actions of linking, embedding, posting, categorising, commenting, tagging etc. Hypertexts send you on a little adventure to other pages or media that are are connected through their mutual ideas and discourses.

I took a look at this example of a hypertext…

http://wefeelfine.org is a little project that I discovered through Number27.org, a link that was provided by my tutor Hannah. We Feel Fine is a hypertext that explores the emotions behind ‘I feel’ and ‘I am feeling’ through filtering through blogs to find these phrases, and collecting the sentences in which it is mentioned to encapsulate a whole heap of different emotions. #feelings

After exploring this hypertext, I then got to thinking- how is my own blog hypertext-ual?

I feel that my blog is hypertext-ual as I am constantly linking words to the relevant material which compliments, enhances or explains the point I am making, makes the joke I am attempting to crack that little bit funnier or even just sends my viewer on a little adventure. If this link is to a relevant video on a platform such as YouTube, the user is then introduced to even more relevant material that is connected by the initial topic or idea via the suggestions bar down the side, showing connected material.

My blogroll links my users to other blogs that share topics with mine or that are written by friends of whom I am connected to and are sharing an educational journey with

My tags organise my posts by idea, allowing users to wade through relative posts on the same topic, along with my categories.

As I now have clarity on the topic of hypertexts, I realised that this ideal exists on a broader scale…

Hypertext may be the foundations of the digital world, the material of which is encompasses and the interactions which occur on its platform, but in a broader sense can also be likened to our non digital world- the connections we have on a physical and subconscious level.

In some way, shape or form, we as humans are all connected in some way. Through workplace, interests, metal friends, beliefs and interactions. Our world is one big hypertext- everyone you meet has some sort of connection to you, whether immediate or distant- they than have connections to a multitude of other people and bursts of information.

Hypertext is a connection, a foundation, a fundamental idea.