Reinhardt's "The Obscene Interface" explores the relationship between sex and violence in the media on one hand, and the rise of the personal computer and the graphical user interface on the other. His principal empirical referent for the essay is MTV's "Celebrity Deathmatch."

The following screen capture reveals the importance of new media in the title of Reinhardt's essay. He has constructed a title image from a set of images from both MTV's popular program and the personal computer, and inserted his title into the image. The entire essay is presented within the context of a sound clip familiar to anyone who has seen the World Wrestling Federation on television, and begins to construct Bolter's "synaesthesia."

And yet textual argument of this essay is strictly linear—notice the scroll bar on the right of the screen capture. The links just below the title image drop the user down the page to particular paragraphs of the essay. The effect of this "navigation" is to invite the reader to simply read the essay using the scroll bar.

Alongside the linear textual argument, however, is a series of images designed to enhance the persuasive power of the argument itself. The following screen capture illustrates the relationship between the textual argument and the visual elements of this new media essay.

Reinhardt visually links the image of the claymation "Celebrity Deathmatch" announcer to the constructed image of a blond woman next to an explosion. At the same time, his textual argument asserts that there is an important relationship between sexuality and violence on television and violence in the world. In this example, the images are not quite evidence for the claims made in the essay. They work more like a rhetorical device to persuade the reader to accept the claims.

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