I just bought a new car this past weekend. Sometime after I got home, maybe the next day, I picked up my owner's manual and started to skim. How's this for amusing...on page 4 of a 320-page manual, you find the instructions:

Before you start to drive this vehicle, read this manual.

Umm, yeah sure. This would make perfect fodder for a Dilbert comic featuring Tina the Tech Writer. "You can't be serious." "No, the lawyers say this covers our butts."

Speaking of tech writers, there's been a furious discussion going on on TECHWR-L. It started innocently enough about the possible parallels of figure skating judging to technical communication judging (talking about technical vs artistic scores), and wound up being a flame fest about the importance of content compared to design...with just a little bit of signal and a whole lot of noise. IMO, some of the signal came from Michael Shea and Eric Dunn. Sigh, the truth is obviously in the middle ground. Both accuracy and presentation are important, but I guess that's no fun, huh?

Meanwhile, over in the IA world, there's been a far less heated conversation between fans of the new AIfIA (like me) and those in the IT and design communities who are wondering what the fuss is all about. One of the interesting comments is from Rory Ewins, who distilled AIfIA's 25 theses into 10...saving about 500 words in the process:

1. Information exists in communities of meaning.
2. We increasingly live and work in information environments.
3. There is too much information for us to comprehend easily.
4. We seek places that meet our information needs.
5. The Internet is a shared information environment.
6. We now expect all information environments to be as accessible, as immediate and as comprehensive as the Internet.
7. Making information relevant and timely requires specialists.
8. This work is a new kind of architecture.
9. The tools of information architecture come in many forms.
10. Sharing the practice of information architecture strengthens the discipline.

Ah, does a tech writer's heart good :). Thanks to Peter for the pointer.

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