Legal Requirements in the New Age
With the recent news this past week about a woman being sued $50K for a tweet she wrote and the resultant backlash on the company that was suing, it started me thinking about legal ramifications of using social media for business. I’m all for using social media as part of an overall tech doc strategy, but this should give you pause.
If you’re a company that is addressed negatively over Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, or whatever else comes out, how do you respond? Will the comments or your response go viral?
Let’s imagine for a moment that you’re using Twitter for real-time tech support. Would you provide an answer in your tweet? Or might you perhaps say a few words and have a link back to your company site, where you have all your legalese spelled out? If you always use links, will your users walk away? There may be a fine line to determine. Only time will tell.
If someone made a negative comment about your docs, might you contact them and write a tweet on their feed (or whatever else) or a direct message to say something along the lines of “hey – thanks for your input. We’ll address that problem.” Or would that run the risk of going viral? What will your response be? What do you address, and what do you let sit? And don’t forget that once something is out there, it can be transformed into something else for a different mode of social media – particularly video.
I believe that when planning a doc strategy, particularly use of social media, you should always consider legal requirements and ramifications as part of the review. Legal considerations are going to flush out with time, as new issues become known (and some very quickly).
Perhaps the best course of action is to come up with a plan now about what you’ll do if something related to your docs goes viral in a negative way. Have some wording worked out with Legal or Communications ahead of time. Have a process for incorporating some immediate sort of change to your docs, FAQ, Twitter feed, Facebook page, or whatever else you have.
Obviously, you won’t be able to address everything that someone might write. There are regular deadlines that must be met, of course. You should, however, be able to identify the type of comment that should be addressed. One suggestion: perhaps an alert level could be established. Go with a simple green-yellow-red stoplight scenario to start with. If you have a plan about what you will or won’t address in what sort of situation, and how to do so, you’ll be ahead of the game. Perhaps if you have a plan, comments won’t go viral because you’ve identified their potential severity and addressed them accordingly – and swiftly. Will your response fuel the flames or put them out?
Consider a plan that identifies who in your company will address phone or other inquiries if something goes viral (read the article and you’ll see what I mean). If you can respond along the lines of “We have a process in place and will have this addressed and fixed within a (set time period)” rather than a perceived-as-negative comment, a situation may calm down as quickly as it arose.
One more thought: if you run a real-time search on your company several times a day, perhaps you can find and address some negative comments before they even get picked up by anyone. Prevention, planning, quick action: those are the new realities.
Reference:
Article from Mashable.com: “Horizon Realty Responds to Lawsuit Twitter Controversy“
Cut, Cut, Cut your Content and Procedures
Sure. We’ve been reducing word count in procedures for some time. It’s time to do more, however. As noted in an earlier post, we have to think mobile. Think small screens and small devices. Screen real estate will be at a premium.
With that in mind, I’m offering some suggestions on how to cut back. Remember that users are now quite computer-savvy. I don’t think we have to concern ourselves with the level of basic understanding as we did in years past.
Personally, I don’t think it’s necessary to include all the bold type such as that shown in The Old Way example. Those would make the screen too busy, anyway. If you stand back and look at that example, what jumps out at you? Right – the bold type. The main item for each step. You can scan those steps and pull out what you need. When you strip out all the extra wording, you’re left with what was bold in the first place. So why not pull all the extraneous wording? Look at The Old Way bold items and look at the Cut More example. Notice anything? Aren’t they the same?
The Old Way
1. Settings > Contacts Settings > Update Contact Information
2. Click the Permissions tab.
3. In the Access dropdown list, select Global.
4. Click Save Changes.
Cut
1. Settings > Contacts Settings > Update Contact Information
2. Tab: Permissions
3. Access: Global
4. Save Changes
Cut More
1. Settings > Contacts > Update
2. Permissions
3. Global
4. Save
In the Cut More example, you can see that I dropped some of the menu titles. I know that we’re supposed to write it exactly as it appears. However, if you can drop a word so only the main one remains, then go with it. (Contacts is the main term of Contacts Settings; is the Settings item really necessary? Of course, in such a case, a chat with the developers about a UI change might not hurt either.) It would be a judgement call every time. You’d have to see what other menu or screen items there are to ensure that there’s no confusion. If you can cut it though, do so.
I think that we could at least go with Cut or Cut More, or perhaps a combination of the two. Get out your scissors and get to work. Keep cutting until you get all the way down to the least common denominator (going back to the days when I had to break down fractions).
The Changing Roles of Writers and Editors
As my friends and family know, I’ve been mesmerized of late by a box of old letters I had stashed in my closet. The letters were from long ago – the late 70s and early 80s – before computers were in use, and definitely before e-mail.
The letters are a joy to read, as they recall wonderful memories and good times with people I’ve not seen in some time, or those I’ll never be able to visit again. Letters were often written over a period of days. Started, put down, picked up a different day. And then that was repeated, until the letter finally found its way to the mailbox.
In stark contrast to this is the technology of today: computers, e-mail, phones. We no longer write letters; we write snippets. In social media, we’re limited to the maximum character length allowed. Server capacity rules. Database limitations rule. Bandwidth matters. Plus we’re all in a hurry, so there’s not much time for reading, let alone writing.
How this applies to tech writing I haven’t completely figured out yet, but I have some ideas. I know content will be more snippet-like with quick delivery and review in mind. Finding, gathering, and monitoring the info is what will gain in importance. How much time will writers spend developing material, and how much time will be spent in searching the airwaves for existing material, determining what’s applicable and useful, and delivering it to users? How can we direct this burgeoning cloud of content?
Folksonomy – Taxonomy – Tags
Everybody puts some sort of tag on their content. Look at any post on any blog and you’ll see tags. What the tech writing community needs to do as a whole is determine some basic tags for all of us to use. This will ensure some consistency, make it easier for people to think of which tag to choose and then apply it, and provide more focused results listings. I’ll write a post and start listing some. Let’s get started.
Editorial Boards
Someone has to moderate all the user-generated content. The role of editor may be expanded from reviewing work of writers only. Writers will still need to prepare information of their own. They will also need to review what others develop to help ensure accuracy – to a point. They will undoubtedly need to look the other way at times, as the freedom to prepare one’s own information must be retained and to ensure that other points of view are represented. However, there will be times when it will be necessary to remove or delete some content. That’s where an editorial board comes in. Set the rules. Establish guidelines for submittals and content. Determine procedures for correcting or removing information. Establish your board now and get busy.
Make it Quick – Whip up a Video
Sure, there are times when it’s preferable to create a planned, long, official nice-looking online tutorial. Much of the time, though, I think you could just take out your little video cam and whip up a gem of a demo. Do we really need to have everything completely scripted and approved and run through the whole process? No. Definitely not. Not everything needs to be polished. Some videos could just be made in minutes and uploaded in seconds. They can’t – and shouldn’t – be too long in duration. For in-house uses in particular, it may be all that’s necessary. And if it’s wrong or outdated? Simply pull out the camera and make another one.
. . . . . .
After reading my letters, I’ve decided to turn off my computer sometimes and write some nice long letters to friends and family. I’ll save my snippets for another day. I don’t want to give up those snippets, but they’re like fall leaves being lifted off the sidewalk by cooling winds: there one moment, gone in the air the next. They’re meant to be momentary. Letters are meant to last.
Tech docs are not meant to last. The technology being discussed is changing so fast that the content is quickly rendered obsolete. People do not want to read that much any longer. We have to be fast, nimble, and prepared to gather, review, and move content quickly.
Might We Become Walking Computers?
What do an article in Wired magazine about attaching a sensor to your running shoe and uploading it via iPod for data analysis, a camping trip, an article about wearing video screens, a scientist husband, a discussion about wildlife parks, office work, and work by a W3C working group have in common? If you can bear with me for a moment, I’ll tell you.
We’re going to turn into walking computers. That’s what I think. This will enable us to leave cubicles and exist in our natural habitats – sans clunky laptops and the like. Crazy idea? Perhaps. Now for an explanation: here is how all this fits together (in my mind, at least).
First, a short while back I found the article on Technology Review about video screens on clothes (There’s a post about it on this blog: Use of Flexible Screens in Documentation.) Development is underway for video screens that can be “worn on wrists, and plastered on clothes.” Ok. So that’s the computer-on-clothes aspect of this.
Second, the Wired article is about how Nike and Apple have developed a sensor that you can hook on your sneaker and which uploads information about your run to the iPod you’re wearing, and you can access the data via iTunes and Nike. That’s more of the computer-on-clothes aspect, but which goes one step further: uploading data.
Third, on our recent camping trip at a lake, there was a duck family that swam around each day right by our campsite. They were in their natural habitat. My husband, in his work and in the group with which he works, focus on natural habitats. We had a family discussion at dinner the other night about wildlife parks and zoos, and I said I preferred to see creatures in their natural habitat. That made me think about office work and cubicles. Nobody likes cubicles. We would all prefer to be in our natural habitat – and an office doesn’t fit that description. Our lake campground was close to a resort town, so we saw many people in town in their natural habitat – one where they could have fun. Everyone was in casual clothes. Not a suit in sight.
Fourth, just yesterday I came across information about a W3C VoiceXML working group. I didn’t know that there was such a thing. Is there a future where one will be able to talk and have some data somehow uploaded somewhere? I haven’t read it in detail, but just the thought of it has my imagination running wild.
So here it is, all wrapped up: maybe we’ll be able to leave offices and work in our natural habitats (whatever or wherever that may be) and wear computers on our clothes, sneakers, and who knows what else, upload data via devices such as the sensor/iPod scenario, use VoiceXML for processing, and download videos and info onto our sleeves. Perhaps this could all be powered by using Velcro to strap a solar-panel strip on said sleeves. Who knows? Who needs a laptop when you just need a shirt, some sneakers and an iPod, and a mobile phone gizmo in your ear?
Think Mobile When You Write
Always keep the small screen in mind when you’re preparing your docs. There are some W3C “mobileOK” guidelines to consider to ensure that your content meets requirements. Here are some highlights:
Tables
- No nested tables
- Tables must have more than one row and more than one cell per row
Page Titles
- There must be a Title element in the Head section, and it must not be blank.
Frames
- No frames. These don’t work well for search engines anyway, so it’s best to avoid them.
Images
- No image maps
- Images must have height and weight measurements, and they must be in pixels
- Images must use alt tags, and there must be text in the tag (not blank)
- Transparent graphics for spacing: no large ones
These are just a few items. There’s enough, though, to consider. When you plan your content, think mobile.