The New Media Reader, Establishing the Geneology of the Computer as an Expressive Medium

In 2003 computer scientist Noah Wardrip-Fruin of the University of California, Santa Cruz, and Nick Montfort, professor of digital media at MIT issued The New Media Reader, with introductions by Janet H. Murray of Georgia Institute of Technology and Lev Manovich, then professor at the University of California at San Diego.

This anthology, printed on paper, represented the first attempt to present in a single volume significant representative documents covering the wide range of digital media. As Janet Murray wrote in her introduction, "This a landmark volume, marking the first comprehensive effort at establishing the geneology of the computer as an expressive medium." The 823-page volume, designed by Michael Crumpton, and published by MIT Press, was innovative several ways: most notably through the use of special symbols in the text and the margins that directed the reader to cross-references throughout the book— a kind of physical hypertext. The anthology also contained a CD-ROM containing programs, videos, games, interactive fiction and games.