on Navigation and Interactivity
developed

A primary economic pressure in the multimedia and computer industries has been to maximise the audience for multimedia product. As has been the case for prior media (from book publishing to television) a critical element in developing that audience has been standardisation.

Standardisation in multimedia has meant the establishing of a number of conventions; conventions regarding not only the means of distribution (the red, yellow and green "books" produced for the standardisation of the CD medium are an example) but also issues around interface design and the tools used to access multimedia.

A good example here is the metaphor of the "mouse" and "window" in computing. Since 1980 the mouse/window paradigm of the human/machine-interface has gradually gained dominance, till now very few computers do not use it in some form or another. Obviously the success of this design-paradigm has been founded on the fact that it was a very good idea.

However, although it may be a good idea it does have its problems. For example, with such a system it is very difficult for more than one person to use a machine at the same time (here the term "personal computer" takes on a new dimension). In the case of interactive work, which often is concerned with the interaction amongst people as much as it is with interaction between individuals and machines, this presents a problem.