This paper on paper is not this paper. This odd statement positions this work at the current inflection point in the history of communication, when the print medium is giving way to new varieties of performative media. In developing this "paper" in both print and electronic versions, I have consciously acknowledged this historical location and sought to straddle the two eras. This intellectual work in each format has both similarities and differences. Is the novelization of a movie the same intellectual work? Yes and no. So I say that in printed form alone, this work is incomplete. This paper on paper is not this paper.

An intellectual work which straddles eras and technologies in this way is guilty of transgression of boundaries, and incurs risks. This "paper" may give rise to boundary anxieties of several varieties. As both a cultural study and an analysis of technical problems it trangresses the boundaries between theory and practice. It trangresses viewpoint by merging the outlooks of a librarian, a philosopher, and a technologist. But I know of no other way to come to grips with the beast that I have chosen to hunt. The crisis in scholarly communication is a formidable monster that menaces much of academia, and if I run risks in the pursuit, then so be it. I hope that my methods and approach will not be considered too outré or unconventional.

My choice of the two particular analytical works by Lyotard and Bourdieu stems from the fact that they may also be seen as transgressions straddling theory and practice to some degree, which hopefully resonate with my own themes. My claims about the Internet emerge from the collision of Bourdieu's cultural capital and Lyotard's performativity in contemporary society. In analyzing this theme in a work of cultural capital that is itself performative (a functional work, in which for example, one can frequently follow active hyperlinks to cited material), it is my hope that I may synthesize their concepts in an inventive manner.