Scalar is an open source, free to use authoring and publishing platform. It was designed for author's to easily write and publish long-form, digitally born scholarly pieces. Scalar's software has the built in means to assemble different types of media and combine them with writing. There are little requirements for technical expertise and the end goal of Scalar's creation was to form a standard for digitally born scholarly work. Katherine Hayles writes on digital publishing, "digital publishing raises questions of authority, legitimacy, and institutions". This thinking is mirrored in the work of Jaron Lanier who writes, "digital replacement technology for the printing press is in an age where authorship is not a priority". The following breakdown of Scalar as a publishing platform includes my own time spent while using the platform and understanding what they offer as displayed by the creator's of Scalar.

The developers of Scalar wanted to create a platform that made it easy for writer's of any technical skill level to create a scholarly piece that includes media. As scholarly articles move toward the digital realm, Katherine Hayles believes a new criteria must be born as "digital scholars look for aesthetics first". The writing portions of the stories can be placed and moved wherever the author feels works best with the media. Through multimedia elements the author has the ability to directly interact with the audience. The combination of elements brings truth to Marie-Laure Ryan's words, "Visual media alone cannot articulate meaning, but with other can". As Abbe Don writes, "[There] must be some level of interaction to gain feedback/response". For example if a video is the primary part of one page, that can be highlighted while the text is submissive. It allows the author to create different atmospheres for each page by highlighting different elements.

The writing of a Scalar piece is as important as the media elements that support it. In some cases, the text may serve only to provide further details toward the video or image that is being displayed. Although there may be multiple instances of media on a single page, the reader does not lose interest or focus on what the author is trying to convey. Often the media will reflect or mirror the text. 

Scalar is open source, and free to use with the only requirement being an account necessary to compose a piece of comment on others work. The website is accessible on any platform, and the articles will change to fit the size of the platform that the reader is using. This allows for the multimedia pieces to work as intended no matter how the story is being viewed. On every page of the stories are built in tools for sharing and the articles remain on Scalar indefinitely. 

Scalar wants to promote the use of multimedia within scholarly articles as the developers feel is how the industry is moving. With that in mind, Scalar makes full use of how reader's react to differing stimuli by allowing the easy addition to any of their works. The atmosphere that the stimuli creates maintains the balance between being scholarly and entertaining the reader.