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*Everything* depends on the industry you're, on regulations that apply to that
industry; on the latest product liability lawsuits within that industry that may
lead to recommendations within the industry that additional measures be taken
that go beyond regulatory requirements; and on new developments in technology
within the industry that may cause a jury in a lawsuit to conclude that not
employing a new precaution still constituted negligence even if it was not yet
codified in regulation .
While you're doing all this research, one other thing you may want to do is look
into errors and omissions and professional liability insurance, especially if
you're working 1099. Your client company's liability insurance will almost
never extend protection to you or other non-W2 contractors, and if you make any
changes or recommendations for changes to safety-related information or even
express the opinion that existing safety-related information doesn't seem to
need any changes, you have just stuck your neck in the civil liability noose.
In a situation such as the one described, I would completely skip over all the
safety warnings and icons except for spellchecking, grammar and formatting, and
provide a note stating my lack of qualification to create or modify these parts
of the client's product documents and saying that I would implement whatever
their regulatory and safety people decide to require.
Gene Kim-Eng
----- Original Message -----
From: "Wade Courtney" <wade -dot- courtney -at- gmail -dot- com>
It may depend on the industry you're in though.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Geoff Hart" <ghart -at- videotron -dot- ca>
> On the other hand, you may be required by local legislation to use
> certain icons. For example, there's are clear standards for icons used
> in the North American "Workplace Hazardous Materials Information
> System", for the transportation of dangerous goods by tractor-
> trailers, and for consumer products. You'll need to research your
> specific industry to find out what legislation governs icon use for
> your specific product in each country where you sell the product.
Free Software Documentation Project Web Cast: Covers developing Table of
Contents, Context IDs, and Index, as well as Doc-To-Help
2009 tips, tricks, and best practices. http://www.doctohelp.com/SuperPages/Webcasts/
Help & Manual 5: The complete help authoring tool for individual
authors and teams. Professional power, intuitive interface. Write
once, publish to 8 formats. Multi-user authoring and version control! http://www.helpandmanual.com/
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