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Subject:Re: Case of Absent Admonishment From:Tim Altom <taltom -at- IQUEST -dot- NET> Date:Thu, 13 Nov 1997 19:00:47 -0600
At 07:34 PM 11/13/97 -0500, you wrote:
>So the question: aside from possible loss of job (boss has
>no sense of humor cause we cost the firm $n,000s), what is
>OUR (TW) liability in the Case of the Absent Admonishment ?
>
>john glenn sfarmh1 -at- scfn -dot- thpl -dot- lib -dot- fl -dot- us
>
Practically speaking, not much for employees. The law has barriers for us to
hide behind. For example, if we're employees, there's respondeat superior,
meaning that somebody else above us had responsibility, thank you very much.
Go see the boss with the bad sense of humor.
As consultant/contractors, though, there's a greater danger. Even if we get
all the sign-offs in creation, we can still be pulled in as parties to the
case. And although the chances are outstanding that we wouldn't lose, most
of us would be ruined several times over. If you've ever been a party to any
kind of lawsuit, you'll know what I mean.
The law of torts (civil wrongs) is a tangled one, and as noted in the
snipped parts of this post, varies by jurisdiction. But in most cases, you
have to 1) have a demonstratable harm, and either 2) have meant to do the
dastardly deed, or 3) known that something would or could happen, and have
failed to stop it.
After that, God knows. The problem comes in with the vague "knew or should
have known." How are you supposed to know such things? Obviously, experts
know. A PE is being held to a very, very high standard. The law expects
such professionals to take responsibility, often even for things that aren't
their direct fault. We lower-class toilers aren't expected to know so much
and be so responsible. We have bosses and our bosses have bosses. We're not
expected to shoulder the "knew or should have known" burden all by
ourselves. Further, as tech writers we're almost never experts in the
technical areas we're writing about, shielding us still further.
However, what about those of us who are engineers, chemists, biologists, or
in other professions where we ARE expected to be experts. If we're called on
the legal carpet for writing something that hurts somebody, and we're, say,
possessed of a PhD in the subject, are we more liable to be liable?
Probably. Can't say. And if we are liable, is it as a technical writer, or
as a presumed expert who just happened to be writing about it?
It's not just chemical spills and biotoxins, either. I wonder how liability
would be assigned if you're a Microsoft-certified expert in something and
you write about it, somebody follows your instructions, and loses a day of
network time in a Fortune 100 company when the net crashes like a safe
through a greenhouse roof. Maybe you can't hide behind your bosses then,
because YOU were the presumed expert.
Ah, sweet speculation of doom and destruction. What a pleasant way to pass
an evening.
Tim Altom
Vice President, Simply Written, Inc.
317.899.5882 (voice) 317.899.5987 (fax)
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