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> --Some of the confusion about technical writers comes from the fact that
> it's a relatively new profession.
Minor correction - it's not as new as you think. Programming had become
a recognized job title in the early 60's, though there still weren't
many of them, largely because there weren't many machines and they were
awfully expensive. Technical writing was a recognized profession, too,
but it was mostly hardware and military. By the late 60's, howevever,
there were plenty of software tech writers around, and by the early 70's
those who didn't know how to write about software were finding tech
writing gigs few and far between. Osborne Publishing Co. was one of the
first to publish software titles, and among its first software books was
an under-the-hood analysis of CP/M.
So tech writing isn't really new, not even relatively.