Blurb:

The aim of this study is to verify if persuasive technologies can be treated not simply as semiotic resources but first and foremost as appraisal resources. The premise is that dealing with digitality does not mean attending to more or less simple tools and instrumentalities but with technologies of signification which are created and designed to establish relationships of signification. They participate in meaning making processes such as an online document, a multimodal text, an interface, a blog, a social network profile, or a wiki page. These digital technologies are aimed at a further development of the text and their designers should conceive of them as meaning potential simply because their users perceive of them as meaning actuality.