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Encounters in Hypertext
Hi everyone,
I fell in love with twee/twine for its deceptive simplicity. When I recently set out to create a collaborative hypertext project I first looked to twine for a simple, out of the box solution. At that point, twine didn't exactly cater to my needs (open, real time, and online collaboration), though it seemed that the newest version at the time might offer such capabilities. However, being in its early release stages, it was not quite ready to go. In response, I used the TiddlyWiki architecture to create a product that suited my needs. Having developed this project over the last several months, I'm now releasing it back into the wilds from which it came in order to hopefully improve it and possibly provide yet one more tool for the digital writer.
Before introducing the Encounters project, let me first ask that you please let me know if you encounter any difficulties, spot any (hopefully simple) improvements, or are interested in helping clean up the packaging for wider distribution to its intended audience of creative writing students, teachers, and organizers.
The following is the abstract from the recent AAWP Writer's Conference, for which this project was originally developed. Some short remarks which accompanied the presentation are also attached.
Encounters in Hypertext
As more readers turn to the internet and personal electronic devices for their reading needs, it is evident that electronically mediated literature will continue to play an increasing role in our reading habits. It is therefore important that current and upcoming generations of writers begin experimenting with this medium. Encounters in Hypertext, an open-source hypertext authoring system, is thus designed to introduce users to the joys and struggles of working in collaborative hypertext environments. Its clean interface makes it an inviting space to read and write, while its straightforward design allows users to experience new media authorship without the technological hurdles that may otherwise present themselves in similar systems. Easy to learn and deploy, it facilitates individual as well as collaborative writing projects for conferences and events, and is also a great addition to the creative writing classroom. It is further capable of being downloaded and published on alternate sites and personal computers with great ease. As such, it is not only a powerful learning tool and great introduction to hypertext writing, but also a simple way to publish and share individual and collaborative writings with a broader audience.
To visit this instance of the Encounters project, please visit http://encounters-in-hypertext.tiddlyspace.com/. Originally developed with limited password protection (in order to protect the integrity of the site and contributions), I set up a dummy password for this instance as well. You can sign in with the following credentials.
username: encounters-in-hypertext
password: encounters
Please note that having created a second instance of the project for this release may mean that I missed rerouting some links or changing some of the branding. Let me know if, where, and when you encounter such instances. Otherwise, I hope you enjoy reading (and writing!) within the system, and I look forward to your feedback and contributions.
Regards,
Paul ML Belanger
I fell in love with twee/twine for its deceptive simplicity. When I recently set out to create a collaborative hypertext project I first looked to twine for a simple, out of the box solution. At that point, twine didn't exactly cater to my needs (open, real time, and online collaboration), though it seemed that the newest version at the time might offer such capabilities. However, being in its early release stages, it was not quite ready to go. In response, I used the TiddlyWiki architecture to create a product that suited my needs. Having developed this project over the last several months, I'm now releasing it back into the wilds from which it came in order to hopefully improve it and possibly provide yet one more tool for the digital writer.
Before introducing the Encounters project, let me first ask that you please let me know if you encounter any difficulties, spot any (hopefully simple) improvements, or are interested in helping clean up the packaging for wider distribution to its intended audience of creative writing students, teachers, and organizers.
The following is the abstract from the recent AAWP Writer's Conference, for which this project was originally developed. Some short remarks which accompanied the presentation are also attached.
---
Encounters in Hypertext
As more readers turn to the internet and personal electronic devices for their reading needs, it is evident that electronically mediated literature will continue to play an increasing role in our reading habits. It is therefore important that current and upcoming generations of writers begin experimenting with this medium. Encounters in Hypertext, an open-source hypertext authoring system, is thus designed to introduce users to the joys and struggles of working in collaborative hypertext environments. Its clean interface makes it an inviting space to read and write, while its straightforward design allows users to experience new media authorship without the technological hurdles that may otherwise present themselves in similar systems. Easy to learn and deploy, it facilitates individual as well as collaborative writing projects for conferences and events, and is also a great addition to the creative writing classroom. It is further capable of being downloaded and published on alternate sites and personal computers with great ease. As such, it is not only a powerful learning tool and great introduction to hypertext writing, but also a simple way to publish and share individual and collaborative writings with a broader audience.
---
To visit this instance of the Encounters project, please visit http://encounters-in-hypertext.tiddlyspace.com/. Originally developed with limited password protection (in order to protect the integrity of the site and contributions), I set up a dummy password for this instance as well. You can sign in with the following credentials.
username: encounters-in-hypertext
password: encounters
Please note that having created a second instance of the project for this release may mean that I missed rerouting some links or changing some of the branding. Let me know if, where, and when you encounter such instances. Otherwise, I hope you enjoy reading (and writing!) within the system, and I look forward to your feedback and contributions.
Regards,
Paul ML Belanger
Comments
Is or will this be moderated in any way? Who will have access to it?
I see one potential risk: users adding random stuff that has nothing to do with the nodes/story they branch off of, producing a jumbled mess of random passages without any direction or point. Which I guess wouldn't necessarily be a bad thing, depending on the goal of the exercise.
On the other hand, if people were to spend time to write quality passages, it could be really good. I feel the biggest weakness of the old school CYOAs was the shallowness of the writing. It makes sense, when you're writing hundreds of different possibilities that you don't want to take the time to develop characters, etc, but for me the plot-driven series of events felt shallow and lacking.
Anyway, great job. I look forward to playing with it.
Sorry about the delay in responding.
I have been monitoring this instance of the site, but that's been easy because no one has added anything yet.
Anyhow, the site is actually designed so that individual users or groups of users can start their own. This means that moderation would be up to the group in question. Let me know if you want to set up your own instance.
I also agree that CYOAs lack any real literary quality and that their object orientated nature has a lot to do with this. That's why my initial target audience has been creative writing classes and writing groups. The other thing done to combat some of the pitfalls of CYOAs and other multilinear hypertexts is to maintain linear narratives rather than netted ones. This allows the readers/writers to read without fear of getting lost and to simply add their nodes to the end of the story they've been following without having to worry about how it matches up with what nodes come after it.
Well, I hope this finds you well, and that you have a chance to go back and add a few nodes of your own!
All the best!
Cheers,
MM