TABLE OF CONTENTS As we have seenin instant-messaging clients, technology is well suited to satisfying certain needs. There israpidity to IM, which even beats out the modern e-mail junkie s responsiveness. It is well suitedto dynamic content, which for participants flows from the whims and intents of the moment. And itis perfectly suited for directed content, in which your IMs are narrowcast to (hopefully) yourintended audience.
But what if the content isn t dynamic? What if the content is essentially fixed and has alife span of greater than one IM or e-mail exchange? What if you have a piece of art a writtenstory, for example that you want to communicate? You certainly could type it up in an IM, but if itis intended to have a life outside of that communication and be read again by others, this isn tthe best use of technology. Better to save it to an external file, say, a word-processing document,and then call up the file as needed. You could copy and paste this file into a message or even justtransmit the whole file inside an IM or attached to an e-mail. This will work to get your story toa few people that you want to direct it to.
What if you want it to be available to more people and potentially even unknown recipients?You would then have to look at alternative technology to distribute your file. Certainly, a Webpage...
