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First Draft of the
Revolution

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Discoverable narrative in digital works.

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Liza Daly   (Thanks!)

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Ibis Reader logoThreepress logo

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2011

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1985

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When I was 12,
I thought I was living in
the future of books.

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One or more “interactive fiction” games dominated the software sales charts for almost a decade.

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81 | screen capture of zork 82 |
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88 | “You’re five hundred miles above a sea of ice, hurtling in 89 | profound silence over the Arctic atmosphere. Layers of crimson 90 | and violet describe the curve of the horizon, blending 91 | imperceptibly into a black sky crowded with stars. 92 |

93 |

94 | You watch helplessly as the white door dwindles to a 95 | distant speck, vanishing at last between the horns of the 96 | rising moon.” 97 |

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102 | Article called 'Computer Books Storm Industry' 104 | 105 |
106 | Hand-drawn interactive fiction map 108 | 109 | 110 | Snippet of handwritten BASIC code 112 |
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115 |
116 |

The interactive fiction game “Adventure” can be experienced in 117 | 187 billion trillion unique ways.

118 | 119 | Mary Ann Buckles, Interactive 121 | Fiction as Literature 122 | 1987 123 | 124 | 125 |
126 |

127 | Imagined screenshot of Zork 128 |

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The first graphical
web browser is introduced

133 | Screenshot from the browser Mosaic 134 |
135 | 137 | 138 | Screenshot from the game Myst 139 |

140 | Myst: 141 | 142 |

143 |
144 | 145 |
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Click Here to Join
My Books in Browsers Web Ring!

150 | Animated 'under construction' GIF 151 |
152 |
153 | Screen shot of home page from 253 by Geoff Ryman 154 |
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156 | Screen shot of home page from 253 by Geoff Ryman 157 |
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“Eloquence is being redefined. “Text” has lost its 163 | canonical certainty. How does one judge, analyze, write 164 | about a work that never reads the same way twice?” 165 |

166 |
167 | The End of Books, Robert Coover, New York Times (1992) 168 |
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171 | 173 |
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“Hypertext fiction”

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176 | A graph showing interest in hypertext fiction peaking in 2000 and then sharply declining 177 |
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Story-driven
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User-controlled
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Fun
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Games

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Art

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Mood-driven
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Author-controlled
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“Important”
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199 | 2011 200 |
201 |
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203 |

Emily Short

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Freelance consultant in
interactive narrative.

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First Draft of the Revolution

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Advance

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217 | 218 |
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Expand

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225 | “Presenting ‘First Draft’ through interactive letter-writing allows me 226 | to focus on the interpersonal dynamics at a very granular level. I’m 227 | interested in problems of how people communicate – how they 228 | manipulate one another, how they assert control or social dominance, 229 | how they allow themselves to be vulnerable – and I want to show those 230 | interactions rather than telling them.” 231 |

232 | Screenshot from the opener 233 | A scene from First Draft 234 | XML from First Draft 235 |
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240 | What has poetry to do with computer software? They share a great human 241 | myth or trope, an image that could be called the secret passage: the 242 | discovery of large, manifold channels through a small, 243 | ordinary-looking or all but invisible aperture. 244 |

245 | The 247 | Muse in the Machine, Robert Pinsky, New York Times (1995) 248 | 249 |
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