Re: Are tech writers inherently snobby?

[Wade Courtney <wade -dot- courtney -at- gmail -dot- com>]

I'm only a snob about tequila, coffee, beer, and mexican food
w

On Tue, Aug 25, 2009 at 2:41 PM, Karen Field Carroll<kfcarroll -at- cox -dot- net> wrote:
> Hello.
> For the second time in two days, I've posted to the list and gotten an
> off-line reply that I thought reeked with arrogance. Each time I wrote back
> and asked for clarification on the tone, because, as I'll be the first to
> tell you, I'm somewhat defensive and tend to read a lot into e-mails, and so
> I wanted to be sure I'm not being my over-protective self. (In today's case,
> the tone was so obvious I'm pretty darn sure it's not just me.) But this is
> such a consistent pattern--I've worked with many writers who thought they
> hung the moon--that I'm starting to wonder if people in our profession
> (including me, because I can definitely be a snob) are prone to being a
> holier-than-thou.
> Any thoughts?
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: techwr-l-bounces+kfcarroll=cox -dot- net -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
> [mailto:techwr-l-bounces+kfcarroll=cox -dot- net -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com] On Behalf Of
> Gene Kim-Eng
> Sent: Tuesday, August 25, 2009 1:47 PM
> To: techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
> Subject: Re: Have We Entered a Post-Literate Technological Age?
>
> I have my doubts about this one.  I think control enhancements will still
> keep
> most of the maintenance and repair operations out of the hands of end users,
> and
> the "future enhanced" spinning wheel will do more but require no more user
> skill
> than the old models peoples' grandmothers used to teach them to use.  If
> equipment becomes more design-for-service oriented and moves away from
> disposability, the maintenance and repair manuals will still be there, but
> as
> long as the "back to basics" trend doesn't go all the way back to people
> having
> their stuff made locally by village smithies, the people doing the related
> work
> will be providers of repair services.  There will always be some people
> techy
> and ambitious enough to want the Sams Photofact book, but most will bring
> their
> stuff to the repair shop or call the traveling fixers the way they used to
> back
> in the days of tube radios and TVs and cars with distributor caps and
> carburetors.
>
> The transition of tech writers' jobs *back* to being more interesting and
> more
> down-to-earth, but requiring more knowledge of what goes on under the
> hood.has
> already been in motion for some time now.
>
> Gene Kim-Eng
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "McLauchlan, Kevin" <Kevin -dot- McLauchlan -at- safenet-inc -dot- com>
> When your equipment is solid and meant to last, you'll tend to learn a bit
> about
> how to maintain and fix it, rather than count on throwing it away and
> replacing
> it because a new one /i/s/ used to be cheaper than a repair.
>
>
>
>
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> 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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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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