Website Strategies

Browsing through the different websites of the previous class, I was definitely able to pick up some strategies that I could use in creating my analytical hypertext. First of all, the analytical hypertexts had a greater sense of interactivity in them. For example, some websites had photos that would change once you hover on them while some websites have cursors and buttons with effects once you hover and click on them. These graphical nuances may seem meager, but it helps in engaging the reader to the website. The second strategy that I noticed was the greater use of anecdotal accounts in the websites. The first person accounts were effective because not only did they give a “face” to the topic being discussed, but they also helped create a more empathetic and emotional connection from the reader to the topic. This strategy was familiar to me as this tactic is also employed in Schalusser’s inclusion of Elisa’s story in chapter 3 of his book. Finally, another strategy that I noticed was the variety of research material that the websites had. While some took a very formalist approach to finding data (in this scenario, hard facts from scholarly research and articles from professional journals), some websites took material from comedic acts, pop culture and even spoof videos from Youtube. I find this strategy particularly effective because various dimensions and standpoints of the topic are shown. Additionally, while still sticking to the topic and remaining relevant, humor is inserted into the websites. Like the other 2 strategies, this helps engage the user into the website, urging him or her to further peruse the multiple pages of the analytical hypertext.