Hyperlink

Conceptualizing Hyperlinks

A hyperlink may represent two types of relations between linked entities: (1) flow relations and (2) representational relations. First, a hyperlink may indicate information flow from one website to another. For example, when a journalist includes a hyperlink in his or her tweets or article online, that hyperlink directs users to seek additional information from another source. As such, hyperlinking practices are indicative of core journalistic values, such as transparency and credibility. In addition to news articles, hyperlinks are frequently used in blogs to help audiences navigate new information.

Second, according to Michelle Shumate and Noshir Contractor, a hyperlink denotes a representational relation between linked entities. Through hyperlinks, an actor attempts to establish an association with another actor and communicates such affiliation to a third party or the general public. Conceptualizing hyperlinks as representational relations suggests that a hyperlink features an actor’s endorsement and acknowledgment of the other actor.

Receiving a large number of hyperlinks indicates an actor’s authority, reputation, status, social influence, popularity, and legitimacy. In part, the number of hyperlinks received by a website determines its ranking in search engine results. For example, in the context of hyperlinking among nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), NGOs [Page 429]that receive the most hyperlinks are leaders in a social issue or social movement. Through representational hyperlinks, NGOs strategically express their affiliations and establish symbolic alliances with like-minded actors, forming a bounded social issue network.

Hyperlink Networks

The totality of hyperlinks among a set of websites constitutes a hyperlink network, where the nodes are websites and the ties characterize the presence (or absence) and the direction of hyperlinks among them. There are several features of hyperlinks and hyperlink networks. First, hyperlinks incur no cost for the message receiver to have additional hyperlink ties. Second, the in-degree distribution (i.e., the number of hyperlinks that actors receive from other actors in the network) in a hyperlink network is highly skewed. In other words, a small number of actors attract a large number of hyperlinks, and the number of actors that receive very few hyperlinks accounts for the majority in the network. This is also referred to as preferential attachment or the “rich get richer” phenomenon.

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