Better than Free: User Documentation?

Kevin Kelly has posted an interesting post called “Better Than Free.” It’s about what succeeds in a market where most assets are free. “The internet is a copy machine….When copies are super abundant, they become worthless. When copies are super abundant, stuff which can’t be copied becomes scarce and valuable.When copies are free, you need… Read more »

New how-to/instructional video sites

Another how-to/instructional video site has been launched – Howcast. The video player on the site lets you jump to different chapters or steps, lets you zoom in for a better look, and provides the transcript as well. Viewers can add comments in the form of tips, warnings and facts to each video. Howcast joins Expert… Read more »

The user assistance skill set

We were having a clearout when I found a handout from a presentation made by Joe Welinske on the user assistance skill set. Although this presentation must have been made four or five years ago, it still rings true today. According to Joe’s survey, the skill set of for user assistance comprises: Writing Editing Indexing… Read more »

What does single sourced content mean to readers?

Lyn Gattis kindly sent us a copy of her PhD dissertation over the Christmas break. She used some content from the Cherryleaf Web site in her dissertation, which looked into the comprehensibility of single sourced technical documents. In her dissertation, Lyn painted this scene: “Judi Greene is evaluating the capabilities of ‘CommonText’, a new single… Read more »

Can technical authors be “part of the conversation”?

I was reading a post by an acquaintance of mine, William Buist, on how advertising will need to change in the future. He wrote: “At a recent conference Mark Zuckerberg, the 23 year old boss of Facebook was talking to 250 or so “middle aged” advertising executives about the news ways that Facebook envisaged advertising… Read more »