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Subject:Re: The lone writer sig From:Sella Rush <sellar -at- APPTECHSYS -dot- COM> Date:Wed, 10 Jun 1998 13:25:07 -0700
I didn't get to Anaheim and meet with the Lone Writers, so hopefully anyone
who did will speak up about any issues that came up at the meeting....
There were a couple of ideas that prompted the Lone Writer SIG. First, it's
establishment had nothing to do with this list, which isn't affiliated with
STC, so its validity has nothing to do with this list. Personally, Techwr-l
is still my primary source, mainly because it draws from a much larger pool.
A year or so ago, some of us noticed that a lot of advice and comments among
tech writers tended to assume documentation departments or teams--or at
least a much more formal organizational structure than most of us belonged
to. The suggestion to "coordinate with marketing" wasn't exactly applicable
to someone like me, who *is* marketing when the need arises. So we thought
a group made up of solely lone tech writers would result in more focussed
advice.
We also had visions of setting up support structures--linking loners who
lived near each other and/or did similar jobs. This idea is still in the
works and I hope will go into effect when I figure out how to make our
membership database available on the web with all appropriate security
concerns addressed.
Another initial goal was to begin examining the unique conditions of the
lone writer, and start drawing some conclusions to build on.
We were also concerned about new tech writers whose first job was as a
loner. While they might not know about this list, they might get plugged
into a larger community through STC.
As I mentioned, one of the big issues with this SIG is finding volunteers or
interested parties to participate in anything more than the listserv, which
isn't surprising considering that most lone writers are sorely overworked.
But remember--a SIG isn't just some entity that dishes out value to its
members, it needs to have value poured in first. That's why I'm stuck where
I am.
We may find that the Lone Writer SIG will die a natural death (although
probably from lack or participation rather than lack of interest). If so,
that's ok. That's the way these things work.
I'm glad this thread came up. There's a lot this SIG could do if people
took a little time.
Sella Rush mailto:sellar -at- apptechsys -dot- com
Applied Technical Systems (ATS)
Bremerton, Washington
Developers of the CCM Database
