>[!abstract] >Years ago, hypertext writers and researchers were concerned that hypertexts would enmesh readers in a confusing tangle of links. Early research called this the Navigation Problem. People sought to solve it in many ways: by providing many navigational tools; by keeping links simple; by using fewer links; and by organizing the links very rigidly. > >In time, experience with actual hypertexts and the development of the Web suggested that the Navigation Problem was less forbidding than it had seemed. Hypertext writers and researchers alike discovered that readers weren't getting lost, that occasional disorientation was common in all kinds of serious writing, and that muddled writing was more likely to be the source of confusion than hypertextual complexity (Bernstein, 1998). >[!abstract] >In addition, search engines do not address the problems encountered during navigation (colloquially known as “surfing”) which often lead users to “getting lost in hyperspace” meaning that when following links users tend to become disoriented in terms of the goal of their original query and the relevance to the query of the information they are currently browsing; we refer to this problem as the navigation problem. Moreover, current search technology does not make adequate use of past knowledge about the individual user who is using the system or of past experience gained by the group of users he belongs to; such knowledge can be used to adapt the system to the user’s goal (Levene, 2002). ## References - Bernstein, M. (1998). Hypertext gardens: Delightful vistas. https://faculty.washington.edu/farkas/HCDE510-Fall2012/BernsteinGardens.pdf - Levene, M. (2002). The navigation problem in the World-Wide-Web. In: Gaul, W., Ritter, G. (eds) *Classification, Automation, and New Media*. https://doi.org/cqrpjk