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Re: "Surviving the Dying Career of Technical Writing"

Subject: Re: "Surviving the Dying Career of Technical Writing"
From: Gene Kim-Eng <techwr -at- genek -dot- com>
Date: Wed, 23 Mar 2016 13:46:00 -0700

The key distinction in this discussion is not when people first started "doing what we do." It is when people first started being employed /primarily/ to do it; when, "you built that, you document it," first turned into, "we need to hire someone to document that."

Gene Kim-Eng



On 3/23/2016 9:20 AM, Rick Lippincott wrote:

The B-17 Flying Fortress flew for the first time a dozen years before that, and it had a full set of operation and maintenance manuals. You can buy a reprint of the pilot's manual online for under $15 US, for goodness sake. Who wrote these? Elves?

Sears & Roebuck used to sell, at least as far back as the 1920s, houses in kit form. Your deliverable was a truckload of components, all stamped with numbers, and a bound leather manual describing how to build the house. What job title would you give to the person who composed that manual? I think "Technical Writer" fits the bill.

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RE: Re: "Surviving the Dying Career of Technical Writing": From: Gene Kim-Eng
Re: "Surviving the Dying Career of Technical Writing": From: Rick Lippincott

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