Landow on the Metatext

Landow points out that the paradigm underlying hypertext is the network. Hypertext blurs the boundaries between individual documents by linking these documents together into a metadocument, an borderless text that cannot shut out any other document. It weaves a document into a web of other documents.

The WEB forms a global metadocument composed of tens of thousands of interconnected pages woven into a network with a vast number of navigable paths. Furthermore, this network is fluid, ever-evolving, new paths forming, old paths disappearing.

According to Landow this has profound implications, that redress some of print culture's distortions. It destroys the notion intellectual separation between documents, that a document is a complete, unique statement. The WEB returns us to a more oral notion, that of the ongoing conversation, one that spans the globe. Millions of users sitting around a global campfire swapping tales.

WEB Paradigm	Why.	Media Theory.	History and Prehistory	Print Paradigm.
Multimedia Paradigm.	Hypertext Paradigm.	Docuverse Paradigm.	Interactive Paradigm.	Conclusions