I
realize that the term "collaboration" implicitly includes an
element of intentionality. Authors are said to collaborate in making meaning
when they work together to create a text, and all writers involved in the
production of such a text are listed as co-authors.
However,
linking enables the writer to engage in de
facto collaboration. In authoring a Web page, for instance, the writer may
refrain from elaborating a topic, choosing rather to point to other writers'
elaboration by linking to their texts. The writer may also situate his or her
own text in relation to others' texts on the same or related topics by linking,
rather than by summarizing others' contributions on the topic. The review of
literature embedded in a print text may take the form of an annotated list of
links on a Web page. Thus, the effect for the reader may be not much different
from reading collaboratively written texts.
Furthermore,
in the evolving text of a single listserv thread or a single topic discussed in
a computer conference, the total discussion of the thread or topic is
collaboratively produced, whether contributors are consciously contributing to
the collaboration or thinking of their own contributions as individual,
stand-alone texts.