Fox Tales: What Changes Are
Revolutionizing Your World?

By Susie Lynn Fox, 2007-2008 LSC President

This year the Lone Star Community (LSC) council has identified a strategy to move our much beloved LSC Web site from the Web 1.0 world to the Web 2.0 world. In the heyday of the Web 1.0 environment, users surfed, searched, found, and read static, controlled information. In the emerging Web 2.0 world, users can find, mix, and share information, use social networking tools to stay in touch with virtual communities, and work with others to write content for the Web.

Leading the effort to move the LSC Web site into this brave, new world is LSC Web master Alan Oak along with LSC Web master gurus of local lore and legend, Paul Holland and Elizabeth Bailey. The Web master gurus, LSC council, and other hardy volunteers are pioneering a trail to determine requirements, consider usability study findings, and choose technological tools.

At the same time, immediate past president and volunteer wrangler, Mel Haughton, is forging a parallel path at the University of North Texas (UNT). Technical communication professors have agreed to assign LSC Web site class projects to UNT student teams.

The end result of these two distinct, yet related, efforts will be the synergy of using and adapting the best ideas for the LSC Web site’s new look, feel, and function in the Web 2.0 environment. All the students will be winners as they learn to work on real-world projects in the classroom, add to their portfolios, and meet LSC professionals.

LSC wins because everyone gets a voice in the project, including the fresh voices of area students and the input of experienced professionals. If you would like to chime in on the ongoing conversation, please contact LSC Web master Alan Oak with your ideas.

All this talk about ushering the LSC Web site into the Web 2.0 world of wikis, blogs, really simple syndication (RSS) feeds, and so on has reminded me how much the art and science of technical communication have changed and continue to change.

Keeping up with the latest, greatest technological advances is not always easy, but luckily STC and LSC consistently offer quality conferences, workshops, and programs that inform and inspire us. An excellent example is the 2007-2008 program year that LSC first vice president Elisa Miller has put together for us.

Looking back over my own career as a technical communicator, I’m surprised at how much technology has changed and how much I’ve learned in real time, bit by bit! My trip down memory lane might be different from your experiences, but probably just as amazing in hindsight. I remember when:

Electric typewriters replaced manual typewriters. The IBM Selectric was the Cadillac of electric typewriters with its golf ball font element. Fore!

• Computers replaced electric typewriters. Computers remembered what you typed so writers didn’t fill their trash cans with crumpled-up drafts that began, “It was a dark and stormy night…”
• Cold type (computerized) typesetting replaced hot lead typesetting. Cold type stopped movable type in its galley…move over, Gutenberg!
• Personal desktop computers, like Apple Macs and IBM PCs, replaced large mainframe computers, like the IBM 360 with its punch card reader. Could the predictions of a PC on every desk (at work and at home) really come true…somewhere over the rainbow?!
• Multi-tasking, what-you-see-is-what-you-get (WYSIWYG) word processing systems, like the Xerox Star, replaced single-tasking, command-driven text editors. Now writers could juggle writing, running other programs, and chewing gum all at the same time!
• Computerized page layout systems, such as pioneering Aldus (later Adobe) PageMaker, replaced manual page layout and paste up operations. The masses could do layouts to their hearts’ content without training, scissors, or glue!
• Electronic publishing options reduced costly and lengthy print shop processes and introduced just-in-time (JIT) deliveries. Data storage emptied warehouse storage!
• E-mail systems began shifting the balance of power from traditional phone and mail services. Why talk to the person in the next cube when you can click Send?
• The World Wide Web evolved from an obscure academic and government experiment to a worldwide epidemic that is still changing the way we communicate, do business, research, learn, and socialize. Say “Hello” to the new global economy!
• Online Help and online documentation turned traditional, linear, printed documentation on its head. Now you can find any topic at any time and still have your table of contents, too!
• Electronic documentation began to increase as printed documentation began to decrease. Visual learners click with online content, but tactile learners still want a warm, fuzzy document to hold and highlight!
• Adobe Acrobat Portable Document Format (PDF) documents, readable from any computer platform, bypassed the limitations of file sharing constraints among different types of computers. PDF levels the playing field!
• Cell phones emerged and exponentially began morphing into multi-technology panaceas that leave old land-based phones and single-technology solutions marooned. Cell phones are today’s Swiss Army knives with a personal ring tone!
• Souped-up graphics programs, like Microsoft Visio Professional, set the bar for old-style graphics programs, typed figures, and pen-and-ink drawings. Making a picture worth a thousand words has never been easier!
• Web-based applications, Internet Web sites, and intranet portals make data available wherever you are. Click a link, and you are there!
• Powerful and speedy computer search engines, like Google, began to supplement the time-intensive, traditional research methods (aka library card). Caveat: Always consider the source when Googling!
• Podcasts and Webinars popped up as new ways to train. Hearing and seeing is believing and learning!
• Accessibility and usability became mantras for communicating with everyone. That’s priceless!
• The latest flavors of markup languages are continually replacing markup languages of yore. GML, SGML, HTML, XML, et al., ad infinitum!

This is obviously a short list of technological wonders. I’m sure you can think of many more marvels that have revolutionized your technical communication experiences. In the meantime, I’m looking ahead and imagining how the LSC Web site might someday soon use wikis for its standard operating procedures (SOPs) or might provide the latest information about local job leads via RSS feeds. And who knows, we might have a blogger in our future midst who can tell the never-ending story of technical communication to the world.