Using an interdisciplinary approach that combines cultural theory, new media theories, and computer science, this thesis provides the first thorough analysis of Puppet Motel, one of the most significant new media art pieces of the 20th century. To support this analysis, innovative descriptive techniques that provide an interactive visual model, allow the reader a level of involvement that furthers the understanding of the description. The ability to not just describe an interactive new media concept, but to demonstrate it as well, is only possible in this context.

The Description section is premised on two questions that serve as guides to examining interactivity. The two questions, Where am I? and What can I do?, are appropriate for a screen-based interactive space. Certainly different results would have been obtained from different questions. The choice of questions is of fundamental importance to the descriptive process. As different types of interactive new media evolve, different questions will be necessary to provide meaningful evaluations of those works.

The investigation of syntagm/paradigm provides an analysis whose history reaches back and whose possibilities stretch forward. Despite being based in the semiotics of Saussure, who sees language as the fundamental signifying system, the analysis provides a fresh new perspective. Syntagm/paradigm are seen less as an opposition and more as parallel perspectives through which new media can be understood. Contrary to what the title might suggest, Manovich's approaches in The Language of New Media are not generally language based. Syntagm/paradigm provides Manovich with a basis for exploring the larger notion of database/narrative in new media. As with syntagm/paradigm, database/narrative is seen less as opposition and more as perspectives through which new media can be understood. Ironically, current methods for programming electronic computers are all fundamentally language based, relying on the strict grammar of computer programming languages.

For the purposes of this thesis, Manovich's five principles of new media provide the a formidable starting point for examining interactive new media. It is the generality and non-specificity that makes these principles so useful. Past attempts at identifying the essential traits of new media serve to illustrate part of the history of the project.

In 1988, Joan Truckenbrod identified four elements of the new communication landscape that electronic technology provides for creative expression in the arts (Truckenbrod: 1988). The four elements, malleability, transformability, responsiveness and transmittability serve to foreground characteristics of new media that were useful at the time but now seem somewhat dated. Transmittability, for example, at the time was forward looking but now seems dated.

In 1998, Janet Murray identified four characteristics of the digital environment that serve to provide a distinctly narrative perspective (Murray: 1998). Her terms, procedural, participatory, spacial, and encyclopedic provide a useful framework but are difficult to apply to new media in general. The usefulness of Manovich's five principles can be seen in their ability to subsume these two sets of terms and many others. As Manovich states himself, only time will reveal the longevity of his terms, but certainly they serve as an excellent new basis on which new analyses can be constructed.

In a time where the dissemination of works is increasingly important, this thesis provides a timely analysis based on what is well recognized as a groundbreaking new theory of new media. The production of this thesis as an Internet document facilitates dialogue to a much greater extent than would a work published, hard copy form in a library. The ability to examine this work and engage in a dialogue about it will, I hope, serve as a model for those interested in taking on such a task.