Webcast: The state of the tech comm industry
In this webcast recording, Sarah O’Keefe, Scott Abel (The Content Wrangler), Race Bannon (Oracle), and Paul Perrotta (Juniper Networks) discuss the state of the technical communication industry.
Content strategy
Webcast: Ensuring success with your CCMS
In this webcast, guest presenter Chip Gettinger of SDL discusses key success factors for component content management systems.
Webcast: Trends in technical communication, 2013
Our trends webcast has become an annual event, and it’s our most popular webcast! Each year, we take our best shot at trends for the upcoming year with a mixture of serious and not-quite-serious predictions. In this webcast recording, Sarah O’Keefe and special guest Bill Swallow, aka techcommdood, share their perspectives on trends for 2013.
Webcast: The business case for better tech comm
This webcast recording is a preview of our new Content Strategy 101 book, which will be released in September. Here, Sarah O’Keefe discusses why content strategy is important and how you can use it to transform your technical content from “necessary evil” to a business asset.
Webcast: Trends in technical communication, 2012
In this webcast recording, Sarah O’Keefe and guest presenter Char James-Tanny discuss tech comm trends for the upcoming year and beyond. Topics include use of the cloud, help authoring tool innovation, business value, adoption of standards, shift to mobile, and more.
Webcast: Content strategy in technical communication
In this webcast recording, Sarah O’Keefe explores how to develop a content strategy specifically for technical content. That means stepping back from the temptation to focus on tools and instead taking a hard look at what the users need and how best to deliver it.
Webcast: The economics of information
In this webcast recording, Sarah O’Keefe discusses how the cost of developing content affects what is actually created. She leads with a discussion of Gutenberg and how we went from gorgeous, unaffordable, artistic books that took years to produce to more plebeian but affordable books. Then she considers today’s situation, with particular attention to the possibilities of video, information apps, and a look at what has NOT changed.
Webcast: Content strategy for software development (with Ray Gallon)
Content strategy is usually thought of in the context of web development. But today’s software is increasingly information-rich. Software is a content vector, and we need to manage the life cycle of that content. This webcast from guest speaker Ray Gallon adapts content life cycle management principles, taken from web-oriented content strategy, to software development cycles. Some examples from real experiences illustrate this adaptation.
The economics of information
Originally published in tcworld e-magazine, July 2011
In Europe before the 1450s, books were precious, rare objects and were usually copied by hand over a period of months or years. Johannes Gutenberg and his printing press changed the economics of information distribution.
Webcast: The State of Structure, 2011
In this webcast, Sarah O’Keefe discusses the results of Scriptorium’s 2011 survey on structured authoring. Topics include adoption rates, tools, implementation costs, lessons learned, and much more.
Calculating the ROI of DITA
The Darwin Information Typing Architecture (DITA) provides an XML architecture for technical communication. Although implementing DITA is likely to be faster and easier than building your own XML architecture from the ground up, DITA is not suitable for everyone.
Webcast: Crafting Clarity in a Climate of Chaos
Scriptorium hosts Tristan Bishop of Symantec as he discusses what technical writers need to do to keep up with transforming communication methods and rapid advances in global, mobile, and social dialog.
Webcast: Trends in technical communication, 2011
In this webcast, Nicky Bleiel of ComponentOne and I discuss trends for tech comm in the upcoming year.
Webcast: Calculating the ROI for XML and DITA topic-based authoring
In this webcast, Sarah O’Keefe discusses how to calculate the return on investment of an XML/DITA implementation for technical content.
If you are considering XML and DITA, but are trying to figure out whether you can justify the cost and effort, this session is for you.
Webcast: Content strategy analysis for technical communication
In this webcast, Sarah O’Keefe of Scriptorium offers an overview of content strategy analysis with an eye toward the implications and business case for your organization.
Anyone can write
published in STC Intercom, September/October 2010
“Anyone can write.” How many times have you heard that tired cliché? And how did it ascend to a cliché? It’s pretty clear to me that most people are terrible writers. When someone says, “Anyone can write,” they actually mean, “Our writing standards are so low that anyone can meet them.”
Webcast: Extracting deliverables from DITA
In this webcast, Sarah O’Keefe of Scriptorium surveys DITA’s publishing options and weighs their practical implications.
Webcast: Knowledge integration: The future of technical communication
Scriptorium hosts Tristan Bishop of Symantec as he muses on technical communicators’ evolving roles.
Webcast: Trends in technical communication for 2010
Sarah O’Keefe, Ellis Pratt of Cherryleaf, and Tony Self of Hyperwrite
Find out where these three presenters see the industry going. This event is for managers with tech comm responsibility, with or without prior technical writing experience.
The state of structure in technical communication
In early 2009, Scriptorium Publishing conducted a survey to measure how and why technical communicators are adopting structured authoring.
XML: The death of creativity in technical writing?
Originally published in STC Intercom, February 2010
I spend a lot of time giving presentations on XML, structured authoring, and related technologies. The most common negative reaction, varied only in the level of hostility, is “Why are you stifling my creativity?”
Does XML really mean the Death of Creativity for technical communicators? And does creativity even belong in technical content?
XML & lone writers: can they go together?
STC Intercom, December 2009
The relatively low percentage of lone writers who have implemented XML is a logical result of the typical lone writer working environment. Given the current status of the authoring and publishing tools, any lone writer who implements XML will need to master fairly demanding tools and technologies.
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Friend or foe? Web 2.0 in technical communication
The rise of Web 2.0 technology provides a platform for user-generated content. Publishing is no longer restricted to a few technical writers—any user can now contribute information. But the information coming from users tends to be highly specific, whereas technical documentation is comprehensive but less specific. The two types of information can coexist and improve the overall user experience.
The State of Structure
In early 2009, Scriptorium Publishing conducted a survey to measure how and why technical communicators are adopting structured authoring.
Of the 616 responses:
- 29 percent of respondents indicated that they had already implemented structured authoring.
- 16 percent indicated that they do not plan to implement structured authoring.
- 14 percent were in the process of implementing structured authoring.
- 20 percent were planning to do so.
- 21 percent were considering it.
This report summarizes our findings on topics including the reasons for implementing structure, the adoption rate for DITA and other standards, and the selection of authoring tools.
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