TechWhirl (TECHWR-L) is a resource for technical writing and technical communications professionals of all experience levels and in all industries to share their experiences and acquire information.
For two decades, technical communicators have turned to TechWhirl to ask and answer questions about the always-changing world of technical communications, such as tools, skills, career paths, methodologies, and emerging industries. The TechWhirl Archives and magazine, created for, by and about technical writers, offer a wealth of knowledge to everyone with an interest in any aspect of technical communications.
Subject:You wanna be a *what*? From:DURL <durl -at- BUFFNET -dot- NET> Date:Wed, 29 Oct 1997 14:42:16 -0500
Dear Tracy,
Boy, were you lucky. I was actually in a course titled *Technical
Writing* but what it really was, was a way for us English majors to take
an additional advanced comp course.
I asked the instructor one time if he thought I could make a
living at writing. He told me No--that altho I was a good writer, there
was no money to be made. But by "write," he meant War and Peace--I doubt
he even knew that there really was a technical writing profession. Or
maybe he thought girls couldn't do it--early 1970s.
Thanks to his ignorance (and my own, but then I wasn't a
professor of technical writing), it was almost 15 years before I knew it
was a profession.
Mary Durlak Erie Documentation Inc.
East Aurora, New York (near Buffalo)
durl -at- buffnet -dot- net
