First agriculture and then manufacturing and then information - and finally expertise. Information is free and so something has to have value - this is expertise. (See What comes after the information age by Andy Oram)
What expertise is valuable? Expertise about agriculture and manufacting? Perhaps.
"But a combination of technological support and user commitment could promote more online learning. We should have rich media that allow people to differentiate themselves through avatars or other indications of personality, and technologies for forums that mix the immediacy of chat with spaces for posting and manipulating files. Culture change is also required: experts have to be willing to guide a new user step by step during explorations of a problem, and the new users have to take correction in good humor. " (Oram)
Sarah O'Keefe, founder and president of Scriptorium Publishing responds with a White Paper: "Friend or Foe? Web 2.0 in Technical Communication" in which she discusses why people turn "to the chaos of the Web" rather than reading the manual. She suggests technical writers ensure their user guides display in Google search results. She says this is what will allow people to find expertise as opposed to chaos.
The Read Write Web Environment
I don't agree. I think people turn to chaos instead of the online help or user guide because they don't trust corporate-speak anymore if they ever did. They don't trust big brother to help them with their problems. They know there are hundreds maybe thousands of people out there just like them with the same issue and they crave this community of answers. They would rather hear from, say, Beth, 27, in Tulsa than consult a stiff, impersonal online help content window. Users consider unfiltered content to be valuable (O'Keefe 11, 2009).
Wikis, blogs, webcasts, you tube, facebook, twitter, and storefronts, such as Amazon, with product reviews by real people, enable the voice of the real person vs the traditional paid-columnist or corporate-backed writer (Cifuentes 2009).
By 2003, 44% of adult Internet users had participated in the interactive capabilities of the Internet by posting in at least one read/write Web environment (Lenhart et al. 2004).
The Real Technical Writing 2.0
O'Keefe projects the future of technical writing as more of gatekeepers for product documentation. She states that the paid technical writer will have to keep up with user-created content and comments on the Web and respond to this content or take it into consideration when maintaining the documentation (13). Unofficial documentation will continue to dominate over official documentation.
The "chaos of the Web", then is really the preferred method because it is personable, current, relevant, and it just feels good. Technical writers will have to learn to write like they are someone's best friend rather than some company's employee. They will have to maintain the integrity of product documentation in keeping with corporate strategy.
Users Determine the Rise and Fall of Products
Perhaps Technical Writing 3.0 then will be all about researching and validating user-created content and compiling a living user guide based on that content. The online help and user guide of the future will be the voice of the user and not the corporation. This will spawn a new age in product design, corporate strategy, and technical communication. The product documentation of the future will involve the following:
1. a living user guide, more like Facebook, of running commentary from actual users of the product
2. product development based on feedback
3. corporate strategy geared towards preventing negative feedback
In a sense, Web 2.0 will cause a major disruption in the way corporations make money and the way corporations communicate. Since users will be driving product development and therefore the bottom line, users will own the product. The surviving products will enjoy a ride not unlike that of a major rock star or other iconic figure. The rise will be meteoric as micro blogs, tempered by savvy technical writing agents, tout the features and benefits of a user-designed product.
And the fall will be like taking down an NFL runningback just before the goal line, seconds before the game ends. Users will take products up and take them down. Technical writing agents will try to manage both the needs of the corporation and the emotions of the user. Kind of like a family therapist, which is what a technical writer is afterall.
Sources
Cifuentes, Lauren, Amy Sharp, Sanser Bulu, Mike Benz, and Laura Stough. 2010. "Developing a Web 2.0-based system with user-authored content for community use and teacher education." Educational Technology Research & Development 58, no. 4: 377-398.
Lenhart, A., Horrigan, J. B., & Fallows, D. 2004.
Project.Oram, Andy. 2007. "What comes after the information age." O'Reilly Radar. (http://radar.oreilly.com/archives/2007/09/what-comes-after-the-informati.html)
Pontin, Jason. 2009. "A Manifesto: NEWSPAPERS AND MAGAZINES WON'T VANISH. BUT THEY WILL CHANGE." Technology Review 112, no. 3: 8-9.
Content creation online. Pew Internet & American Life
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