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Subject:RE: Disagreeing with house styles From:"Dan Goldstein" <DGoldstein -at- riveraintech -dot- com> To:<techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com> Date:Thu, 5 Jan 2012 10:30:47 -0500
In addition to the other excellent advice you've just received, I have
one more point: The best time to improve your company's style guide is
after you've done enough work there to become their indispensable
writer.
The worst time to improve your company's style guide is when your
arrival is still "recent." This applies not only to style guides, but to
quality procedures in general.
-----Original Message-----
From: Sion Lane
Sent: Thursday, January 05, 2012 5:28 AM
To: techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
Subject: Disagreeing with house styles
I've recently joined a new company and, on review of the doc set I am
working on, found some terms that I considered to be incorrect -
specifically 'voice mail' and 'web site'. I initially assumed that this
was down to the previous writer, however this is the preferred usage
according to the house style guide, which specifically says 'do not use
voicemail/website'.
It jars every time I see these terms and I am uncomfortable using them
in my docs. Do I just suck it up and use what I consider to be outmoded
terminology? I am a sole author at this site and don't know who the
owner/originator of the style guide is, or how widely the style guide is
used company-wide.
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