Guenther 1

Nathan Guenther
Daniel Powell
ENC 3241
February 9, 2015
Critical Analysis One: Technical Reports
From a first impression, as an avid technical reader and knowledgeable enough in both
areas, I was able to clearly understand both authors. However just judging from the Abstracts, I
noticed that The Art of Digital Publishing tended to use a lot more technical jargon, and expected
the reader to be at least familiar with some terms. One sentence in particular threw quite a few
technical concepts together at once, First, in closing the gap for non-web-technical authors to
express ideas and concepts through Web technology without the knowledge of coding or user
interface design, by mapping a typesetting language to interactive programming. While many of
these are basic common terms within this community, all together it would be extremely
overwhelming for an outside reader. For just the introduction the reader may assume the rest of
the dissertation would be over his or her head. While engaged readers could probably still get the
gist of everything, I suspect it would be more frustrating. On the other hand, Content
Conditioning and Distribution for Dynamic Virtual Worlds, took the time to not only explain the
situation, but also define the main terms right from the abstract. Metaverses are threedimensional virtual worlds where anyone can add and script new objects, is a perfect example
where the reader now understands exactly where everything stems from when moving forward.
To make things better, an example is given: Second Life, immediately with a further explanation
before introducing the Next Evolution of Metaverses: Sirikata. Therefore I must conclude that

Guenther 2
Jeff Terrace with Content Conditioning and Distribution for Dynamic Virtual Worlds is a
stronger communicator for the widest range of his audience.
All was not bad for Daniel Lynch however. He took advantage of the technology he was
writing about itself, and provided visual representations and examples throughout. As a reader, it
seemed easy to get lost among all the technical details and some redundancies. Thankfully the
clean graphics portrayed after various subsections, reminded me what I was reading about, and
gave me a quick image to ponder with. While Jeffs design principles were not awful, or graphics
nonexistent, he could have done a much better job illustrating the scenes he was describing in
these multiverses. Some example renderings would have been easy to obtain, and could vividly
illustrate the pros and cons of different situations. Apart from the ascetic principles, the actual
readability of the publications is arguably just if not more important. Here once again, Jeff excels
by breaking down complex concepts, and keeping sentence structures simple. The flow of his
paragraphs feel very natural, and almost conversation like while still formal and professional.
Sirikata is a metaverse platform with a goal of enabling huge, rich, compelling applications. The
Sirikata server scales to support large, complex worlds, even as it allows users to see and interact
with the entire world. For this example, before jumping into an explanation or introducing a
more complex topic, he provides an almost preparatory sentence that is clear and doesnt leave
much up to interpretation. This syntax keeps everything very understandable in contrast when
compared to Daniel, Today thousands of web frameworks exist, at a time where the common
Web browser is a viable computing platform, and through programming we can provide realtime authoring of interactive mathematics across multiple devices with poly-sensory
interactivity. All I can say is Wow, that is quite a mouthful. I can only imagine how Jeff
would have broken that down and introduced things differently.

Guenther 3
Either way, both authors outlined impressive and well organized reports. Most of the
criticisms were small picky details, and depending on the indented purpose of the authors, both
could have excelled and been well received by their respective audiences. Daniel seems to
understand his community extremely well, and the various alternatives and common debates.
This allows him to suggest the best methods to move forward with, to help standardize the
technical typography and design process based on his own relatable experience. If he would like
to resonate with more readers, and push his movement forward even more, he should focus on
simplification and the cadence of his paragraphs. Jeffs report is excellent and the only thing
lacking is some visual assistances to backup what he is describing. Ultimately this makes Jeffs
report stronger as in my trials I felt I was able to retain more and fully understand each section
without much resistance. While Daniels visuals were a great resource, they do not undo the
overload of technical terms.