RE: What do you guys think of STCs new definition for technicalwriter?

["Sean Brierley" <sbrierley -at- Accu-Time -dot- com>]

Hi,

I think the analogy is flawed. We might read books about careers to our
children, but I don't think those books comprehensively define the
careers they describe.

So, while I do think it's possible to tell a five-year-old what a
technical communicator is, and while I believe our profession is
underrepresented in those career books that get read to kids, I don't
for a second think that what we would put in such a book for an audience
of five-year-olds should also pass muster as the definition for our job.

The definition of technical communicator needs to be clear to a
professional audience. It does not need to pass muster with
five-year-old children. My 2 cents, anyway.

Cheers,

Sean 


-----Original Message-----
From: Bill Swallow [mailto:techcommdood -at- gmail -dot- com] 
Sent: Tuesday, May 27, 2008 2:17 PM
To: Sean Brierley
Cc: techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
Subject: Re: What do you guys think of STCs new definition for
technicalwriter?


And if you can't explain it in the simplest of terms then what good is
the definition in the first place?

And to use the "daddy writes books" example, how many books about
careers have you read to your kids over the years? How many books about
scientists, doctors, and other more complex fields? They're not in
depth, they don't use big words, and yet they get the definition across
well to their audience - kids.

I'm not saying let's go out and write a children's book, but if the
definition isn't easy to write in plain common language, then it doesn't
work.

Funny, don't we say the same thing about bad UI design? If it's a pain
to document, then it's likely poorly designed?

On Tue, May 27, 2008 at 1:58 PM, Sean Brierley <sbrierley -at- accu-time -dot- com>
wrote:
> To be fair, this needs to be more than "daddy writes books." <grin>
>
> That is, I am fine writing this for a professional audience, but the 
> definition itself must itself be a *good* example of technical 
> communication.
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