Earlier hypertexts justify their existence more than later ones. Joyce's afternoon (1989) uses the plainest hyper-reflexivity to explain itself. In "dialectic," the author (not the narrator) converses with his wife (ostensibly) and subtextually with the reader. Joyce admits to his level of control, the inability for the reader to respond in anything but blind clicks and a yes/no button:

dialectic

<It's a dreary box you put me in -- I say -- no pun intended…>

<Ha! -- she scoffs -- you indict yourself with much more than this sad pun, which characteristically, you insist upon having recognized even as you claim to deny it. This whole electronic circus, this literary pin-ball machine, is nothing less than wish fulfillment and fantasies of domination… It's not just the foolish obsession with writing as if you were a woman (something any woman would see through -- remember Nora Joyce!), not just the episode upon episode of erotic confusion and quasi-earthmotherish psychobabble (even this!)… No, the whole thing stinks, it's all a fraud: the illusion of choice wherein you control the options, the socalled yielding textures of words… All of it typical, control-oriented male fantasy…!>

The dialectic Joyce has with his wife gives the reader a voice - only one, very characterized voice, but one response to the story at least. And the response that Joyce acknowledges is one that recognizes his reflexive puns as a predominant characteristic of the story.