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Subject:Re: A Controversial Thought From:Susan Mitchell <susanm -at- NCD -dot- COM> Date:Thu, 30 Sep 1993 20:50:48 GMT
In article <TECHWR-L%93093010080959 -at- VM1 -dot- UCC -dot- OKSTATE -dot- EDU>, MSTSACX -at- gsuvm1 -dot- bitnet
writes:
|> A couple of days ago (as well as a couple of weeks ago and a couple of
|> months ago), we heard the common complaint about technical people making
|> editorial changes.
|>
|> Our typical response is telling them that we are supposed to handle all
|> editorial issues and they should only focus on technical issues.
|>
|> And to that I say--BUNK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
|>
|> [...]
|>
|> I think we need to get past the turf wars of "editorial matters are my
|> domain; technical matters are yours." As long as we take an us-them
|> approach, we'll never build credibility.
|>
|> Saul Carliner Ph.D. Student
|> Instructional Technology Geo. State Univ.
|> Note new userid----> mstsacx -at- gsuvm1 -dot- gsu -dot- edu 404/892-3945
I agree with you that drawing rigid lines for who does what prevents
harmony, goodwill, and even accuracy. Even the best editor doesn't
catch EVERYTHING.
However, some reviewers distracted by their urge to edit. We have
enough trouble getting them to review the technical content at all.
It's much easier to find the extra period or the typo and ignore
the lists of memory specs that are tedious to check.
Our cover sheet requests that concentrate on making sure that docs are
accurate, complete, and usable. We do not explicitly prohibit their
marking editorial changes, but we feel free to consider/ignore any
editorial changes they suggest. The last thing we want to do is to
get into a tug-of-war over punctuation, word choice, tone, etc. when
the usefulness of the document is our main concern.
--
Susan Mitchell
susanm -at- ncd -dot- com 415-691-2798
Network Computing Devices, Inc.
