In defense of the scroll vs the codex: "They constructed poetry [scrolls] without a clear linear narrative linking the individual poems, but relied on the scroll to force readers to make interpretive sense…since they had to proceed through the poetry book in that manner."
Conversation
From McCutcheon, "Silent Reading in Antiquity and the Future History of the Book": andymatuschak.org/files/papers/M
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Vandendorpe's "against regression" argument about hypertext-as-scroll runs as you would expect. It mirrors an argument I've made elsewhere—which I now should reconsider!
(this excerpt from "From Papyrus to Hypertext", 123-124)
But what about the advancements of hypertext? Instead of *referencing* something we can instantly *retrieve* something. And we can hardly say the web isn't indexed.
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Sure, this is true; the web is neither codex nor scroll. I don't think that disqualifies either of these passages' observations.
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This file I'm creating (giffmex.org/wiki/surtidas.) is one static html, already at 128pp. It uses two types of sliders w transclusion, so it compacts to just over a page. One can scroll AND not lose the big picture. Made w .
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"Codex" refers to the form we think of as "books": leaves of paper bound together with a spine as "pages", in contrast to a scroll.
This resonates a lot. In fact, for certain usecases, specifically revisiting books, we should cast off the yoke of linearity all together and carve our own paths through the books.. I'm working on a tool based around this very idea, so would love to hear your thoughts on this!
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Many of the concepts are already inspired by/in response to andymatuschak.org/books/, so pretty excited for more directly relevant content from you, especially while it's still WIP!!¡
