Rethinking technical communications, rethinking Technical Authors

Our June newlsetter contains a links to a flurry of articles on rethinking technical communications. We’ve added comments to a number of these articles, and I thought it might be worth summarising our thoughts on the likely future for technical communication. Today, many products are not always “technical” A lot of technology today is part… Read more »

Is re-using content a good or a bad thing to do?

Today’s BBC News Web site has a piece on Ofsted re-using sentences in more than one school inspection report: An investigation has begun into claims that Ofsted approved “cut and paste” inspection reports using identical sentences and phrases…both reports say: “Some teachers do not plan learning for pupils at their different levels of ability and… Read more »

Are telegrams ruining the way teenagers write?

One of the questions I was asked at the STC Summit was if I thought “text speak” (SMS messages) and Twitter were leading to a generation of teenagers who were incapable of writing properly. I replied that it was great that they were writing so often, and that it was encouraging them to write concisely… Read more »

How to build a multi-million dollar business by putting manuals on the Web

One of the issues we’ve been promoting for many years is the importance for Technical Authors to publish their user guides and online Help on the Web. A surprisingly large amount of companies still don’t offer Web versions, for reasons that include: It’s too difficult Our competitors might read it and reverse-engineer our product Support/Training/Marketing… Read more »