Wk 3, Q1: Reader/Author gets new role

The reader of now has to play a more active role and takes on some of the responsibilities of the author. There is also greater room for customizing of the experience and so it might provide for a greater variability of experience. It might also encourage the reader to do more than one exploration of the same narrative to go through different versions of the experience. This is in contrast to the traditional role of a passive viewer that takes in only one perspective of the author and where everyone more or less goes through experience.

The role of the author changes from one where the aim is to present a single perspective to that of one where the author needs to think of multiple possibilities and at the same time linking them together such that there is coherence and the reader will find that it is a well-formed narrative. This would mean that the author has to be able to design the structure of the interaction in such a way that constraints will ensure that the reader will only go through the media in a way that is meaningful to the reader. Instead of being an architect of a single road, the author will have to assume the role of an architect for a whole network of roads, ensuring that traffic flows in a smooth fashion.