Jessie Channey, STC Alberta President

Saying Goodbye to 2011, and to a Friend
After a busy holiday season, it always seems a bit difficult to get back into the swing of things. 2012 seems to be more difficult than usual, as we suffered the loss of a good friend, Brian Thompson, on December 18, 2011. Brian was a welcome addition to our council when he joined as Webmaster in 2010. He was our resident technical expert for things relating to our current website, which he built. Also in 2010, Brian took on the role of Secretary. Brian had a knack for all things technical and he managed to keep his sense of humor through the challenging times. He was a valuable addition to our council, generous in nature, an all around wonderful person. He will be deeply missed. A wake was held for Brian on Sunday, January 15. For more information, visit http://www.mhfh.com/thompson-brian-rowntree/

Kicking off 2012
On January 26, Edmonton and Calgary will kick off the New Year with our Annual General Meeting (AGM). Get all the details: http://www.stc-alberta.org/wp/archives/2711

Meanwhile, STC Alberta’s Twitter Manager has earned us many accolades from MindTouch. They declared @STCAlberta to be one of the top 400 influencers on Twitter in the categories of #Techomm and #ContentStrategy. Mitch Willis and his enthusiastic tweeting has earned STC Alberta the 109th position. Not bad for a year’s work, Mitch! http://www.mindtouch.com/blog/2012/01/06/techcomm-contentstrategy-400-knowledgebase/

Lastly, a reminder of the international competition deadline. Get all your entries to STC Southwestern Ontario by January 20. Get all the details: http://www.stc-alberta.org/wp/event-calendar/international-competition

AGM and Mixer
January 26 2012, Calgary
Join us for our Annual General Meeting (AGM) mixer in late January. Catch up after the holidays, find out who got the best Christmas gifts, and get up to date, especially with all of our accomplishments from 2011– there are plenty of them!

We will be presenting pins to our new senior members, handing out awards and accolades to our stellar volunteers, anddrawing door prizes. Join us and enjoy drinks, appetizers, and each other’s company.
More information and registration here.

The Big 4: Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube
February 16 2012, Edmonton
Join us in Edmonton where we’ll be discussing the basics of the prime social networks that you need to be seen on and how to create engaging conversation on each medium. Our affiliate, the Advertising Club of Edmonton welcomes all STC Alberta members to attend. More program details here.
Register by emailing info@hanlancommunications.com

Jennifer Burgess, SuperScript Lead Editor

STC Alberta lost a vital member of our team when Brian Thompson, a member of the Web Team and the council’s Secretary, passed away on December 18. The success of our new website was largely due to his and Janice’s handiwork. More importantly, we considered him a reliable friend who would always tell you his honest opinion and bring his dry humour to even the most difficult situations.

When I started as a member of the SuperScript editorial team in 2010 I was grateful for his patient guidance with using WordPress and HTML in webeditors. It was largely his forward-thinking approach that led STC Alberta to move SuperScript towards a blog format, which we still use today. He has had a huge impact on SuperScript and the Web Team, and it’s hard to imagine our team without him.

We decided the best way to memorialize Brian was to share our memories of him. Below are thoughts from some of the people who knew him the best.

Janice Liwanag, Web Team Member

I had the pleasure of working with Brian on the STC Alberta Web Team for two years. What I appreciated most about Brian was that he said exactly what was on his mind – no fancy talk or sugar coating, and no beating around the bush.

During the year that we re-vamped the STC Alberta website, if I came up with a lame design idea, he would tell me it was lame. When I dithered about how this widget should function or where that widget should go on the website, he begrudgingly re-arranged the web page and then pointed out the parts that looked lame. If I suggested we try some new-fangled, pre-fab web plug-in, he’d go and research the heck out of it and then email me about how lame it was or how it just didn’t work right…oh, and by the way, it crashed our system and I had to re-set it, thank you very much.

Since Brian was about 20 years older than me, some might say that his attitude was “crusty” or “curmudgeonly”, but I like to call it “honesty”. Imagine the smile on my face whenever I received a compliment or nod of approval from him.

In the world of technical communication, our jobs often require us to strip emotion and opinion out of our writing. I am fortunate to have worked with someone who communicated as openly and honestly as he did. We need more people like that among us.

You’ll be missed, Brian.

Jessie Channey, STC Alberta President

Brian was a welcome addition to our council when he joined us as Webmaster in 2010. He was our resident technical expert for all things relating to our current website, which he built. In addition, Brian took on the role of our Council Secretary. Brian had a knack for all things technical and he managed to keep his sense of humour the entire time. He was a valuable addition to our council, generous in nature, and a wonderful person. He will be deeply missed.

Jeanne Gonnason, New Heights Manager

I enjoyed Brian’s knowledge, dry wit, attention to detail, and thoroughness. His death is a big loss to the STC Alberta chapter.

2012 is starting off great with lots of members joining us! The Alberta Chapter membership has reached 174 members as of January 6, 2012.

New Members

From Calgary:

• Ms. Sue Barazzutti
• Ms. Jennifer Bauer
• Mr. Brian Robert Clark
• Ms. Debra Laieann Clifton
• Dr. Valerie Fleisch
• Ms. Catherine Gingras
• Ms Alyssa Michelle Groves
• Ms. Kari Hass
• Ms. Cindy McCaffery
• Mr. John Angus Ross
• Mr. Jonah Shiu

And one new member from Kamloops:

• Ms. Micki Kosman

Returning Members

From Calgary:

• Ms. Aerin Caley
• Mr. Matt Alexander Jennings

From Edmonton:

• Ms. Vanessa Michaud
• Ms. Erin Ottosen

And a BIG welcome to Diane Cook, our new Membership Manager. Welcome aboard, everyone!

Forget to renew your membership? There’s still time: http://stc.org/join-or-renew-top

Need more information on dues? Visit: http://stc.org/membership/join-or-renew-now/membership-dues

Kelly Parks, SuperScript Writer

Since January brings many new employment opportunities for job seekers, I thought it would be the ideal time to share one of the key discoveries I made while looking for a job: that travelling long distances for any job-related task, such as submitting resumes, will not make a job seeker appear desperate. On the contrary, it is well worth the risks, time, money, and effort; and it can be a key element in landing a job. Many students are quite timid about taking such risks – and with good reason. Most students deal with financial insecurities on a regular basis, and are worried that long distance trips may cost too much to be worth it – especially since there is no certainty that they will get a job. Other students may feel that they are not prepared enough to impress an employer, and that making such efforts will reveal their desperation in wanting to find a job. But I can say with certainty that I didn’t start to get anywhere with my job search until I started taking these risks. It took me a long time to come to this conclusion, and I hope to save other technical writing students some time by sharing my experiences and discoveries.
As a fourth year student in Grant MacEwan University’s Bachelor of Applied Communications program, I am required to find a communications job to complete the requirements of my practicum year. The first three years of the program consist of a number of courses in the technical writing, editing, and creative writing streams. However, the fourth and final year of the program consists of an eight-month practicum. Students are expected to find a communications job to fulfill the requirements of the practicum, as well as write essays on their own time about their job-related experiences.
It’s a lot to take on in the fourth year. Finding the time to write essays on top of a fulltime job is the least of student’s troubles. When it came time for me to find my first communications job, I decided that I should take the opportunity to move away from Edmonton to a different city – like Vancouver or Calgary. Since I am Vancouver born and bred — and homesick — I spent a lot of time applying for positions in Vancouver. However, due to the tough competition and my lack of experience, I was unable to land a job there. So, I turned my attention towards Calgary – a city I always loved to visit, but never had the opportunity to live in. Luckily, Calgary is the place to be for communications professionals, as there are a number of communication jobs available – far more so than in Edmonton.
Read More…

Victoria Clarke, JobLink Manager

The JobLink is still a popular benefit of membership in STC Alberta, and companies are continuing to contact the site to post jobs. I have been tracking the jobs posted each month and have graphed the numbers dating back to mid-2008.

The number of jobs posted in 2011 (57) stayed approximately the same as 2010 (59), but the time of year with the most posting activity changed (February and March were popular months in 2011, while July and August were popular in 2010).

Remember to alert your companies to the fact that STC Alberta posts technical writing jobs (writers, editors, technical illustrators, BAs, instructors, etc), and we post them for free. Send job postings to joblink@stc-alberta.org

Read More…

Adriana Harper, STC Alberta Member

There are a lot of things that I remember, with a smile, about my school days. In particular, I remember when an assignment required 500 or 1,000 words about a particular subject. The word count function became a trusted companion as I added prepositions, conjunctions, and other pieces of general fluff, inching closer and closer to the word count finish line.
Real-world writing is very different. The most important aspect of a written piece is its quality, as opposed to its length. This principle applies both to pieces of writing that are too long for the sake of length, as well as too short for the sake of brevity.
First, let’s take a look at a long piece of writing, using flowery language and a long-winded structure. Although this type of writing has an appropriate time and place, technical writing isn’t it. Extra words can actually cloud the meaning of the piece, rather than add to it. Consider the following example:

The domesticated fowl walked from one side of a paved street to the other side of a paved street.

After reading this sentence a couple of times, you realize that it’s about a chicken crossing a road. The sentence should read like this:

The chicken crossed the road.

This sentence means the same thing as the longer example but only uses half as many words. It’s also twice as clear at first glance, which is very important in technical writing.
The importance of quality over quantity also applies to short pieces of writing. Technical writers are taught to write using short, clear, and concise sentences. However, if this advice is taken to extremes, the end result can be a piece of writing so brief that it would lack any real sense of meaning. In some instances, especially if you are writing about procedures, this can be dangerous if warnings or crucial details are omitted for the sake of brevity.
Let’s look at a recipe for a bread maker as an example. If you don’t add the ingredients in the right order and follow a few important steps, your bread won’t turn out. Imagine if a recipe said:

Add all the ingredients into the bread pan, make the appropriate bread machine selections, and press Start.

This sentence is short and sweet, but it fails to provide some crucial information about using a bread maker. A better sentence would be:

Add all the ingredients into the bread pan in the order specified. Select the applicable bread cycle, choose the crust colour and loaf size, and push Start.

Even though this sentence is significantly longer, it clarifies some key points and includes all the necessary details. Without this additional information, the instructions are inaccurate and incomplete.
Always remember – it’s the quality (not the quantity) that really counts.

Dates: 20–23 May 2012

Location: Chicago-Rosemont, Illinois, at the Hyatt Regency O’Hare

Registration: Now open!

Price: The Really Early Bird rate is only $795 per person for members. That’s $130 less than the Early Bird rate and $230 less than the Advance rate! However, the Really Early Bird rate expires after the first 100 registrants (or 31 December, whichever comes first), so hurry!

Conference Overview

• Takes place 20-23 May in Rosemont, IL, just minutes from Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport
• Over 80 sessions, organized by ten tracks
• More advanced sessions are identified as Institutes
• Registration includes two receptions plus morning and afternoon refreshment breaks (Honors Banquet on Tuesday and Closing Lunch on Wednesday are optional fees)
• SUMMIT@aClick is included in your registration fee
• Conference begins Sunday evening (20 May) with a general session and reception in Expo Hall
• SIG networking events
• Preconference events include certificate sessions and workshop/tutorial sessions (optional fee required)

More information, including rates, can be found here.

By Dave McQueen, Core Instructor, Guru Digital Arts College
Originally published on DigitalAlberta.com

When creating an image in our camera (or on our computer screens) a large part of the goal is to guide the eye to where we want the attention of the viewer to be. Imagine trying to draw the eye of the viewer to the wedding rings on the fingers of a couple of newly-weds.

I’ve long felt that a gentle, subtle approach is key when making (as opposed to taking) a photograph. If we can make it look like we have done nothing to the image then we have succeeded.

Read more here.