Hypertexts have been touted as a comfortable tool for organizing large amounts of information. What first seems to be an enoumous chunk can be broken into its component parts; each component part can be similarly divided, and so on. This sample offers a double insight into this organizing by component potential provided by hypertexts:

Note how the author divides the issue--smoking regulation--into component parts. These parts are the underlined links in the field on the left, which lead to discussion of the moral, health, and political arguments relating to the issue. A link also leads to a node where the author's own conclusions are developed. The sample field on the right shows the linked node, which further develops the moral component of the argument. Dividing the topic in this way prompts an author to consider the different threads her argument might take. Hopefully this will lead to coherence within individual sections and some consideration of the relationship between different components.

The second insight provided by this sample is not as obvious. In the hypercard project, the opening page which contains the links to the three components is rather lengthy; perhaps two and a half or three pages of text must be scrolled through to reach the three components. It would seem that a more precise use of the organizational capacities of hypertexts would divide some of this initial text into component chunks as well. This hypertext requires the reader to plow through lengthy fields of text before reaching the links to more components. In terms of hypertextual style, then, while this sample shows well the potential for organizing information into component chunks, it also suggests room for further organizational sharpening.