Re: Archimedes Socrates, ace tech writer, wins another one

["Michael West" <mbwest -at- bigpond -dot- net -dot- au>]

Bruce Byfield wrote: 

> Those of us who argue in favor of technical expertise. (and I've been 
> known to) tend to assume basic writing skills, such as audience 
> analysis, are a given for working in the field. 

I find that this is not a valid assumption. It may be how things
*should be*, but in fact many 'in the field' lack basic writing skills.

... 
> I'm assuming, of course that most of us would prefer to do an 
> outstanding job, if at all possible. And, even if we can rarely do a 
> perfect job, our work is likely to be more useful if we know what we're 
> writing about by the time we finish (I add "by the time we finish" 
> because, sometimes, the attempt to put a concept into a useful structure 
> is an aid to understanding).


To me, as a product user, the writer's technical expertise or
lack thereof is immaterial. If he or she is an expert 
*communicator*, I will find the content suitable for my 
purposes. As to whether the author really "knows" the 
subject matter, or is only capable of acquiring, organizing, 
and transmitting facts accurately and efficiently enough to satisfy 
my requirements -- I care not at all.

It's interesting that we see the situation so differently.
When I look around, I find innumerable "help" texts that
fail not because their authors didn't "know" the subject
matter (indeed, the vast majority are written by programmers
and engineers), but because they didn't understand what users
need. 

In the article I cited, the unhappy customer's complaint 
wasn't that the instruction manual didn't tell him "why" the 
thing was designed the way it was.  His complaint was that it 
didn't tell him *how* to get the bloody thing up and running
quickly so he could do his real work.

Which complaint do you hear more -- that the instructions didn't 
make things clear, or that the instructions were clear but the writer 
didn't go into enough technical details?
-- 
Michael West
Melbourne








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