Orange County STC Newsletter

www.stc.org March 2010 Vol. 49, No. 3

Book ReviewHandbook of Technical WritingBy Lu Kondor, Adjunct Faculty, California State University, Dominguez Hills

Handbook of Technical Writing is a useful book for both teaching and professional

writing, and it’s a worthwhile pur-chase, even if you’re an experienced technical communi-cator. Although it’s only an optional book for my students, I highly recommend that all students get a copy. According to the preface, the book is a “compre-hensive, easy-access guide to all aspects of technical communication in the classroom and on the job.” The book doesn’t disappoint as a reference for general writing, preparing formal reports, grammatical usage, and even creating resumes and selecting type styles. It con-tains many practical examples and useful descriptions.

The book is designed similarly to a dictionary in which topics are list-ed in alphabetical order as either words or short phrases with defini-tions. What makes this book different and useful are the checklists for various topics, such as headings, using visuals, with such additional information as tips on interviewing subject matter experts. Unfortu-nately, the authors provide the reader with less information on some topics and leave the reader short on details. The book could have cov-ered more topics with greater depth such as charts and graphs.

One practical aspect of Handbook of Technical Writing is the fact that the book can physically stand up to quite a bit of use. The book is spiral bound with a laminated soft cover that is resistant to liquid and tearing. The inside front cover folds out to give the book contents by topic as an option to using the index. Having said that, the interior pages are thin and can be easily damaged and become separated from the book.

The book also underlines all topics found within the book when the topic appears as part of the discussion, which is actually distract-ing to the reader in sections that contain multiple terms used in the book. Some topics covered are remedial such as readers, purpose, or audience. Still, as an overall reference guide, Handbook of Technical Writing is worth owning. The book is a good desk reference for more seasoned technical communication professionals who want to look up something not often used or for those new to technical communi-cation.

This Issue:

Book Review 1

President’s Message 2

Next Meeting 3

Editor’s Desk 4

EduNotes 5

W.C. Wiese, Candidate for Director 6

February Meeting Review 7

Nicky Bleiel, Candidate for Director 8

Chapter Renewal Challenge 9

Society Pages 10

OCSTC Employment Information 10

Orange Slice— Calendar of Events 12

March Meeting Info 12

Handbook of Technical Writing, 9th editionGerald J. Alred, Charles T. Brusaw, & Walter E. OliuCopyright 2009Bedford/St. Martin’s, Boston, MA

2  •  March 2010

President’s MessageBy Betsy Malone, OCSTC Chapter President

Chapter Contacts

OCSTC P.O. Box 28751 Santa Ana, CA 92799-8751

Chapter Fax: 949.830.7585

Web site: http://www.ocstc.org

Administrative Council

President, Betsy Malone, pres@ocstc.org

Past President, Bruce Giddens, ipp@ocstc.org

1st Vice Presidents, Programs, Jane Baker and Suzanne Madison, 1vp@ocstc.org

2nd Vice Presidents, Membership, Penny Marco and Pat Olsen, 2vp@ocstc.org

Treasurer, Shannon Summers, trea@ocstc.org

Secretary, Neala Covell, sec@ocstc.org

Appointees

TechniScribe Managing Editor, Jennifer Gardelle, techniscribe@ocstc.org

Public Relations, Open

Education, Bill Darnall, edu.bd@ocstc.org

Scholarship Chair, Carrie Damschroder, carried@hotmail.com

Webmaster, Jeff Randolph, erandolp@ix.netcom.com

Employment Manager, Betsy Malone, betsybythebeach@roadrunner.com

Committees

Nominating Committee:

Bill Darnall, edu.bd@ocstc.org

Jeff Randolph, erandolp@ix.netcom.com

Bruce Giddens, ipp@ocstc.org

Happy St. Patrick’s Day! Our monthly meet-

ing is one day shy of the holiday this year, and we do indeed have a special treat for you—a field trip to the Microsoft Store in Mission Viejo Mall—where we’ll learn tips and tricks to make our Word 2007 documents sing and dance (well, hopefully)!

We’ll also be able to peruse the store and get the lowdown on new Microsoft products.

Are you interested in public relations? If so, OCSTC is forming a Public Relations Committee to help promote our chapter through print and online media. We’re looking for members with creative and innovative ideas! We need help designing and writing materials for a chapter brochure, fact sheet, corporate sponsorship packet, and more. Please contact pres@ocstc.org if you’re interested in help-ing out.

If you’re thinking about brushing up on some of your technical communication skills, or if you’re interested in learning a few new skills, STC is offer-ing several new certificate courses ranging in topics from business management, minimalist writing, topic-based authoring, and more. Check out www.stc.org for more information and pricing.

And, just a reminder—STC’s 57th Annual Confer-ence is set for May 2–5 in Dallas, Texas. The earlier you sign up, the more you save. (Prices are in USD)

Member Type

Early Bird by 15 March

Ad-vance by 20 April

Walk-in after 20 April

One-Day Rate

Member $845 $995 $1,195 $445

Nonmember $1,045 $1,245 $1,345 $670

Student Mem-ber $215 $215 $215 $95

Student/Nonmember OR Retired Member/Non-member

$450 $450 $450 $125

If you have any ideas or comments about our chap-ter activities, we’d love to hear from you!

March 2010  •  3

Next MeetingTopic: Microsoft Madness in MarchWhen: Tuesday, March 16, 6–9 p.m.

Where: The New Microsoft Store The Shops at Mission Viejo, #578 Mission Viejo, CA 92691 949.325.6100

Cost: Members with reservations $16

Students with reservations $10

Nonmembers with reservations $21

Walk-ins, or those registering after the deadline (no dinner for walk-ins) $10

No-shows billed $16

Reservations:

Due by midnight, Sunday, March 14

Registration:

Online at http://www.ocstc.org/dinres.asp

Directions to the Mission Viejo MallMap of the I-5 and Crown Valley Parkway. The arrow below indicates the store location. Parking is FREE.

If you would like to receive email notifications about upcoming OCSTC meetings, visit http://www.ocstc.org/list_redirect.asp.

Click Join. This list broadcasts only meeting notices and STC announcements

4  •  March 2010

Publication PoliciesTechniScribe is published 12 times a year as a ben-efit to the members of the Orange County Chapter of the Society for Technical Communication. The goal of the publication is to reflect the interests, needs, and objectives of OCSTC members. Techni­Scribe strives to be an advocate for, and an inspira-tion to, technical communicators by keeping them connected to each other and to opportunities for professional growth.

Articles published in this newsletter may be re-printed in other STC publications if permission is obtained from the author, credit is properly given, and one copy of the reprint is sent to the Techni­Scribe managing editor.

Submission InformationThe editorial team retains and exercises the right to edit submitted and requested material for clarity, length, and appropriateness.

When submitting material, please remember to:

Include a 25-word biography about yourself.• 

Send articles in Word (doc, docx), Rich-Text • Format (RTF), ASCII (txt), or in the body of an email message.

Send material to the managing editor • (techni scribe@ocstc.org) five weeks before the date it will be published.

Editorial StaffManaging Editor . . . . . . . . . . . . . Jennifer Gardelle Copyeditor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Teresita del Sol Copyeditor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Anne Stratford Copyeditor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Barbara Young Proofreader . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Suzanne Madison Proofreader . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Michael Opsteegh Proofreader . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Sima Staav Web Version . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Jeff Randolph

Monthly Advertising Rates1/4 page . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . $40 1/3 page . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . $45 1/2 page . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . $60 Full page . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . $80

Subscriptions$10 a year to members of other STC chapters.

PrinterPrintWorks, Irvine, CA

Editor’s DeskBy Jennifer Gardelle, TechniScribe Managing Editor

Tools are a major part of our careers. What do you

use for work? I use Word at work and for articles for this newsletter. I also use In­Design to lay out the pages for this newslette r. There are a lot of tools to choose from, some good, some not so good, but how do we learn to use them without breaking the bank? If we do decide to

splurge just in case we get a job with a company that requires our proficiency in a specific tool, is it worth the risk of forgetting how to use the tool if we don’t use it right away?

Lynda.com (http://www.lynda.com/) offers great tutorials in many tools for a very reasonable monthly or yearly rate. You can also take software classes at the local colleges and universities.

It used to be that companies would pay for you to learn a new program, and this might still be the case sometimes. However, we usually have to go into a new job knowing a program at a proficient level.

What are some of the tools you use for work, how did you learn them, and what would you suggest to people who are just starting out or who have only used one tool and are faced with having to learn a new one? I’d love to print your answers here.

On another note, when looking for a new job or con-tract, what do you do? Networking is a great way to connect with peers and meet new contacts. What are some of the ways you connect with your peers? Some of you go to OCSTC or other professional organiza-tions’ meetings for this. LinkedIn, Facebook, and other online sites also offer peer networking opportu-nities. Do you do a mixture of both? What are some of your preferred sites or organization? Again, I’d love to print your answers here.

If you’d like to share your thoughts about either point (tools or job searching), please contact me at techniscribe@ocstc.org. If you have an article on another topic of interest to OCSTC members, it would be great to print it here.

Not Getting Your TechniScribe?Are you an OCSTC member, but not receiving your copy of TechniScribe by mail? We may have an incor-rect address for you. You can update your informa-tion online at http://www.ocstc.org/changeform.asp.

Not Getting Your TechniScribe?Are you an OCSTC member, but not receiving your copy of TechniScribe by mail? We may have an incor-rect address for you. You can update your informa-tion online at http://www.ocstc.org/changeform.asp.

March 2010  •  5

EduNotesBy Bill Darnall, OCSTC Education Committee

Sticky Ideas

I read the book Made to Stick and found it so helpful that I enthusiastically recommend you read it, too.

It was on my son’s Christmas wish list, so I ordered it from Amazon. The book arrived a few days before Christmas. The subtitle got my attention: “Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die.” I decided it would be cost­effective for me to read the book before giving it away. I’m glad I did. The ideas in the book have helped me improve my writing. On the other hand, I could have saved some valuable gift-wrapping time. My wife surprised me with a personal copy of Made to Stick of my own.

SUCCESsThe coauthors, Chip and Dan Heath, propose a checklist of six commonsense principles you can ap-ply to help make your ideas stick. The authors include memorable examples to help make their ideas stick. You can remember the principles by using the acro-nym SUCCESs, which stands for:

Simple•

Unexpected•

Concrete•

Credible•

Emotional•

Stories•

The opening paragraph of this EduNote employs the six principles. Let’s review the checklist of principles, in the context of the opening paragraph.

SimpleA simple statement or objective is the bedrock on which you build your information structure. I read a book and found it helpful. I recommend that you read Made to Stick.

UnexpectedAn unexpected revelation can help to get the reader’s attention. An unexpected event is likely to be more memorable than a random piece of cold-dead infor-mation. For example, I first learned of the book from my son’s Christmas wish list.

ConcreteThere is nothing fuzzy about the idea that you should read the book. It’s a book that I found helpful. I am recommending that you read it, too.

CredibleI read Made to Stick. I am glad I did. I recommend that you read it. This article uses the book’s SUCCESs ap-

proach. I hope you will find the article’s recommenda-tion—that you read the book—is credible.

EmotionalOriginally, I read the book to save having to purchase my own copy. I used valu-able time at Christmas that I could have spent wrap-ping gifts. When I opened one of my gifts on Christ-mas morning, there was a surprise copy of the book of my own.

StoriesThis article’s opening paragraph tells a story. I recommend that you read Made to Stick. The story is about discovering the book on my son’s Christmas wish list; ordering the book; reading my son’s gift to save the expense of purchasing it for myself; finding it helpful; and then, receiving a surprise copy as a gift from my wife.

How it worksThe six principles the authors reveal are essential components that help you meet your information de-sign objectives. The principles and associated results are:

Principle Result Simple Grasp the essenceUnexpected Pay attentionConcrete Understand and rememberCredible Agree/believeEmotional CareStories Be able to act on it

The first column is a list of the principles (checklist). The second one is a list of the results of applying the principles. The authors commented that they could have based their book on a results framework, rather than on principles. The authors decided, “The Curse of Knowledge can easily render this (results) frame-work useless…The SUCCESs checklist is a substitute for the framework…and its advantage is that it’s more tangible and less subject to the Curse of Knowledge.”

ConclusionThe SUCCESs acronym is a memory aid. The words are a checklist for effective information design and presentation. Application of the six principles helps you build content that will get and keep your readers’ attention. Good luck in using the SUCCESs approach to create “sticky ideas.”

6  •  March 2010

By W.C. Wiese, Associate Fellow

Because of the economic issues and their un-

paralleled impact on STC, this year’s elections are especially important. 2010 becomes another year of course correction for the Society, with a dispropor-tionately high impact on technical communicators.

Will this board of directors be asked to close down STC? Let’s hope not. But economic pressures and STC’s ongoing membership declines mandate change:

STC must become an organization for • the future. We can remain a baby boomer organization and dwindle. But, to survive, we must meet the needs of young profes-sionals and students. That means STC must engage them sooner, learn to speak in new ways, use different communication channels, and address early-career profes-sional needs.

STC must be about jobs. We must do more • to help members find the opportunities they seek, raise perception of STC’s value, and research and share economic metrics that quantify the impact of what we do.

We must strengthen STC’s financial • foundation. We’ll need to match the cost of services to demand for our members, re examine the educational products we offer, and offer value that professionals agree is worth the cost of membership.

STC should partner. We have much to • learn and much to gain from partnerships with smaller professional organizations, such as the Association of Teachers of Technical Writing (ATTW) and American Society for Indexing (ASI). They gener-ally support our interests but haven’t been as severely impacted by the current economy.

STC must mend ties to chapters and SIGs. • These valued groups have always been most effective in promoting STC and generating the leaders who will carry STC forward.

As a former chapter president and treasurer, I recognize that chapter and SIG membership issues are really STC’s membership issues—we must

work together to solve them. Community health is ultimately STC’s health because chapters and SIGs attract members, encourage risk­taking and indi-vidual growth, and generate future leaders.

As STC treasurer, I worked with three STC executive directors in four years, contributing to financial sta-bility during the change process. During my term, I implemented the chapter treasurers’ discussion group to enhance mentorship and communication, supported infrastructure investment, made chapter and STC financial concerns visible to the Board of Directors, and fought to strengthen STC’s financial footing.

I now need your vote to help strengthen STC’s capacity to serve a new generation of members and ensure its future.

Please send your suggestions and concerns to the campaign web site at http://www.stc.org/candi-datesFAQ/.

“So, the writer who breeds more words than he needs, is making a chore for the reader who reads.”

—Dr. Seuss

W.C. Wiese, Candidate for Director

2010Society Election

March 2010  •  7

February Meeting ReviewBy Jennifer Gardelle, TechniScribe Managing Editor

We had another informative and fun presen-tation at the February meeting when Matt

Sullivan presented “The Best Tech Comm Deal from Adobe You Never Heard About.” Matt demonstrated Acrobat.com (https://acrobat.com/), Adobe’s very useful (and free!) communication tool, which is simi-lar to the popular WebEx.

So, what does Acrobat.com have to offer? Plenty, and here’s a brief outline of the great things you can expect to find with the free account. Of course, for a reasonable rate, you can have more, and you might just decide to go that direction.

Acrobat.com offers the following features:

Web conferencing with two other people•

5­GB file storage and sharing •

Online PDF creation (up to five documents • with the free account)

Capability to embed PDFs in blogs or wikis•

Online applications•

Mobile access•

Not bad for a free account. During his presentation, he walked us through many of the features.

Web ConferencingMatt explained that you can start your meeting after sending invitations via email. Note that the people you invite must have an Acrobat.com account. It’s simple to sign up—just provide your email address, a password, and your name. Once you start your meeting, accept the person to let them into the meet-ing.

Michael Opsteegh and Pamela Coca had their lap-tops at the meeting, so Matt invited them to partici-pate in web conferencing to demonstrate the feature. Matt had his monitor projected onto the screen for everyone to see. I was sitting at the table behind Michael and could see his monitor, and there seemed to be no delay between the two.

You have several options with the web conferencing feature. You can maintain control of the conference, give it over to one of the attendees and then take back control, or kick attendees out. For a while, he gave control to Pamela, and we could see her screen as though she were running the meeting—which, of course, she was at the time—and then he easily took back control. This is a very useful feature in case one of the attendees has a document he or she wants to share with the other attendees—no need to email everything to the conference leader ahead of time.

File Storage and SharingThe 5­GB limit for file storage is pretty large and generous for a free account. Matt said he’s up-loaded tons of pictures and other documents and is nowhere near the limit. Using some preloaded pictures of his family, Matt showed us how easy it is to share them with meeting attendees. He cautioned us to use a lower resolution file so that it will load quickly.

Online PDF CreationThis is very easy to do. Just select “Create PDF” from the left­hand panel, and pick a file to upload. Again, you can create up to five free PDFs. With a paid account, you can create an unlimited number of PDFs.

I decided to give this a try, so I used one of my free PDFs to convert my résumé from a Word document to a PDF. Once the PDF was created, I could see it on my Acrobat.com page and was able to download it to my documents from there.

Other FeaturesYou can customize your meeting URL. Matt sug-gests using a name that matches your social media names. You can customize your URL by going into your settings.

Besides creating PDFs, you can also create online, PowerPoint-style presentations as well as tables.

Conclusion I encourage you to sign up for the free account and see for yourself how you can use this great tool. I found it very easy to use and very practical. If you’d like to see Matt’s presentation slides, you can find them at http://blogs.roundpeg.com/2010/02/ocstcpresentation/.

Figure 1. Screenshot of my original Acrobat.com homepage

8  •  March 2010

Nicky Bleiel, Candidate for DirectorBy Nicky Bleiel, STC Director-At-Large

I’m currently serving on STC’s Board of Direc-

tors and am running for another two-year term as Director-At-Large.

My past two years on the Board have been interest-ing, challenging, and im-portant. Interesting because I’ve learned a great deal, challenging because of the hurdles we’ve faced, and important because the Soci-ety is at a critical juncture.

“Change” has been a hallmark of the past year, and STC has been no different. We’ve made many changes to the way we’ve always done things. We made difficult decisions and took difficult actions, all with the intent to strengthen the Society. We made no decisions without careful deliberation and research. So far, those choices have had the intended effect. But there’s still work to be done.

I’d like to continue to serve as a director so that I can see a number of initiatives through and continue the momentum. Specifically, I want to continue work on creating additional revenue sources for the Society (such as Summit@aClick, new educational oppor-tunities, and Amazon and Café Press merchandise sales), helping members in need (for example, Job Seeker Boot Camp and member recovery packages), adding more member value (for example, STC’s notebook blog, the new member logo program), and further enhancing the recognitions program.

In addition to my Board experience, my STC experi-ence includes five years as a chapter leader (includ-ing Pittsburgh’s chapter president), a competitions judge, a conference and webinar speaker, and a regional conference planner. I have 15 years experi-ence as a technical communicator in the software industry. I’m heavily involved in the profession and am a frequent speaker at many conferences, includ-ing STC Summit, WritersUA, tcworld, LavaCon, and DocTrain. I’ve written articles for Intercom, tcworld, TechCom Manager, and more. My areas of expertise include embedded help, tools and technologies, user assistance design, single sourcing, wikis, Web 2.0, and convergence technical communication.

To learn more about me, please see my web site: http://www.nickybleiel.com/, which includes my bio graphy; a list of recommendations from mem-bers; a list of my presentations, articles, and pod-casts; and an overview of my service to STC over the years.

Here are just a few of the recommendations I’ve received from members:

“I wholeheartedly endorse Nicky for a second term as member of the STC Board of Directors. In addi-tion to being an effective technical communicator, Nicky understands the challenges that the profes-sion and the Society need to address. STC member-ship will benefit greatly from her contributions.” Sarah O’Keefe, President, Scriptorium Publishing Services, STC Associate Fellow and

“Over the past three years, I have witnessed Nicky’s strength and excellence on the STC Board of Direc-tors. She cares about STC, knows when to make the hard decisions, and always looks at problems from as many perspectives as possible to find the “truth” of the matter. I’m convinced that the STC BoD is stronger and more successful because of Nicky’s presence.” Linda Oestreich, Manager, SSM Docu-mentation, Hewlett­Packard, STC Fellow and Past President

Please vote for me when you receive your ballot. Polls open March 9. (Reminder: you must renew your membership by February 28 to be eligible to vote.)

“When something can be read without great effort, great effort went into its writing. “

—Enrique Jardiel Poncela Spanish Playwright and Novelist

March 2010  •  9

Chapter Renewal ChallengeBy Pat Olsen, OCSTC 2nd Vice President, Membership

Society Pages

Have you renewed your 2010 STC membership?

If you have or if you plan to, STC has an offer for anyone who renews by March 19. The Orange County Chapter (OCSTC) has 185 members on our roster, but only 51 members have renewed their memberships. We need to obtain a qualifying renewal rate of 60 percent to

be eligible to compete in the renewal challenge.

Chapters in each STC chapter size category that ob-tain the highest renewal percentage rate will receive the following prizes to raffle off to their members:

One 23” full high­definition LCD monitor•

One terabyte (TB) desktop external hard • drive

One 2010 STC Summit registration (all free • registrations must be used for STC’s 2010 Technical Communication Summit in Dallas, Texas, May 2–5).

One 2010 basic membership upgrade to gold•

One 2011 basic membership renewal•

Our chapter size category is Category 3 (151 to 300 members). Winners will be announced March 26.

So Why Should You Join STC?Did you know that STC works with the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) to update the definition of a technical communicator? This directly benefits STC members because corporate human resource de-partments use the BLS data to determine salaries. STC’s work with BLS impacts your sal-ary and pushes companies to recognize the value of technical communicators. Recently, the BLS agreed to add a separate chapter for technical communicators in the next issue of the Occupation Outlook Handbook, an essential reference document for corporations. This means for the first time they acknowledged that tech-nical communicators are distinct from other writers.

Check out the web site at http://stc.org/membership/ for detailed information.

What other benefits do you get for the cost of your membership?

The opportunity to network with your • peers—one of the best reasons

Exclusive access to jobs databases•

Unlimited use of the Jobseeker Boot Camp•

Electronic subscriptions to STC publications•

Savings on continuing education•

Exclusive discounts on products•

Discounts on insurance programs•

Attending meetings provides the chance to bounce ideas off one another, learn about job opportunities, and hear about project shortcuts and new software or tools. Your network includes face-to-face contact at the local and national level as well as virtually through STC’s 150+ listservs.

Hundreds of job listings are posted online at the STC Career Center that members can view 14 days before the general public sees them. After two weeks, the listings are opened to the public. Online listings are searchable by geographic area and salary range.

STC’s Jobseeker Boot Camp is loaded with informa-tive articles on successful job-seeking strategies for technical communicators, tips on conserving money, and more. This members-only feature is a valuable resource for unemployed and underemployed mem-bers.

STC provides four publications for your profes-sional growth. Intercom is published ten times per year, Technical Communication is published quarterly, STC’s Notebook is our blog to keep you informed and receive your feedback, and News & Notes is the monthly electronic summary of announcements and industry news presented on the blog! What a way to stay informed!

Members using the early-bird registration rate to attend the Technical Communication Summit often save as much as $300 to $500 over nonmembers. STC gives members preferred pricing on:

The annual Summit•

Web seminars•

Online certificate courses•

SUMMIT@aClick•

Free sponsored seminars•

STC periodically presents offerings from corporate members who sponsor free, live web seminars on hot

Continued on Page 11 >

OCSTC Employment InformationOur job listing is entirely online at the OCSTC web site. Pages are updated as jobs are submitted.

Staff Jobshttp://www.ocstc.org/employme.asp

Contract Jobshttp://www.ocstc.org/contractme.asp

Free Job Postinghttp://www.ocstc.org/jobsubmit.asp

InquiriesIf you have an inquiry, email our employment manager, Betsy Malone, at betsybythebeach@roadrunner.com.

Society-Level Job ListingsSTC maintains job listings on the Internet. You can download the listings from the STC web site at http://jobs.stc.org.

10  •  March 2010

Society Pages

STC Mission StatementSTC advances the theory and practice of technical communication across all user abilities and all media.

Positioning StatementSTC helps you design effective communication for a technical world through information sharing and industry leadership.

The Society for Technical Communication (STC) is the world’s largest organization for technical commu-nicators.

Its members include writers, editors, illustrators, printers, publishers, photographers, educators, and students.

Dues are $75–215 per year. Membership is open to anyone engaged in some phase of technical communi-cation, interested in the arts and sciences of technical communication, and in allied arts and sciences.

Society for Technical Communication 9401 Lee Highway, Suite 300 Fairfax, VA 22031-1803

703.522.4114 (voice); http://www.stc.org

TechniScribe Copyright and Trademark StatementOCSTC invites writers to submit articles that they wish to be considered for publication. Authors retain copyright to their work and implicitly grant a license to this newsletter to publish the work once in print and to publish it once online for an indefinite period of time. In your cover letter, please let the editor know if this article has appeared elsewhere, and if it has been submitted for consideration to other publications.

The design and layout of this newsletter are copyright-ed as © STC, 2010.

Some articles might refer to companies or products whose names are covered by a trademark or registered trademark. All trademarks are the property of their respective owners. Reference to a specific product does not constitute an endorsement of the product by OCSTC or by STC.

ColophonTechniScribe is written using Microsoft Word, and laid out using Adobe InDesign CS3 for Macintosh. Gill Sans and Palatino Linotype are used for heading and text fonts. PDFs are produced using Adobe Acro-bat Professional 8.

TechniScribe relies on the following editorial referenc-es for style: American Heritage Dictionary, Chicago Manual of Style, and Words into Type.

March 2010  •  11

topics. These are not sales pitches but focus on emerg-ing subject areas presented by experts who are closely involved in their development.

Vendors such as MadCap Software and Component-One are among the corporations that offer discounts on products only to STC members. Discounts are typi-cally 10–15 percent.

STC offers disability, critical illness, life, and long­term care insurance to members through Mutual of Omaha (US residents only; availability varies by state). Pension plans are also offered in cooperation with Marsh Affinity Group Services, a leader in insur-ance program management.

Membership Costs and Payment PlanThese are just some of the benefits that you can have for a basic membership of $215, technical communica-tion student membership of $75, and retired member-ship of $145. The cost to be a member of the OCSTC chapter is $25 (this helps with the renewal challenge). And for only $10 per special interest group (SIG), you can join any of the 21 SIGs.

Are you aware that with your online renewal, STC is offering the option to pay for dues in four equal installments? The monthly installment payments are automatically deducted from your credit card (or credit card­backed debit card) and begin the first business day after your application is processed. The payments will continue approximately every 30 days for the next three consecutive months.

Need more information? Check out the web site at http://stc.org/membership/ for detailed information, or email 2vp@ocstc.org.

Chapter Renewal Challenge< Continued from Page 9

Did you know that shopping at Amazon.com is not only a great place to find books and other items,

it’s also a great way to give back to the OCSTC! The next time you shop at Amazon, please access the

site via OCSTC.org. Amazon donates a percentageof your purchase to the chapter.

Thank you!

Spotlight Awards ReminderJoin us on March 6 for another great evening

at the Spotlight Awards. RSVP at http://www.stcspotlightawards.org/banquet.html

March Meeting InfoMicrosoft Madness in March In March, we’ll be meeting on our regular evening, but in a different location. Join OCSTC on a field trip to the brand new Microsoft store at The Shops at Mission Viejo.

From 6 p.m.–7 p.m., we’ll be offering a box supper, along with networking and an opportunity to tour the store and see all the latest and greatest gadgets Microsoft has to offer. (You’ll be surprised!) That will be followed by a presentation on the new operating system, Windows 7. In-house trainers will share all the features of the new Windows 7, advantages of upgrading, tips and tricks, and even how to use Windows 7 on a Mac.

The Shops at Mission Viejo are located just east of I-5 at Crown Valley, Exit 86. The Microsoft store is on the second floor, across from the food court, between J. Crew and Steve Madden.

Orange Slice: Calendar of EventsDate Event Location TimeMarch 2 OCSTC Council Meeting Airport Executive Suites, Irvine 6 p.m.–7 p.m.

March 6 Spotlight AwardsSarducci’s Capistrano, 26701 Verdugo St., San Juan Capistrano, CA 92675, 949.493.9593

6 p.m.–9 p.m.

March 16 OCSTC Chapter MeetingMicrosoft Madness in March

Microsoft Store, T he Shops at Mission Viejo, #578, Mission Viejo, CA 92691, 949.325.6100

6 p.m.–9 p.m.

April 6 OCSTC Council Meeting Airport Executive Suites, Irvine 6 p.m.–7 p.m.

April 20

OCSTC Chapter MeetingLaura Ann LoCicero, “Networking 101—The Basics of Professional Networking Online”

DoubleTree Club Hotel, 7 Hutton Centre Dr., Santa Ana, CA, 92707, 714.751.2400 6 p.m.–9 p.m.