joeware - never stop exploring... :)

Fred pinged me on my blog entry about Derek’s Tech Target article. He also commented on one of my other articles on grammar and general flow.

I fully welcome these comments and completely fall on my sword and admit that when I am racing through many of these blog articles they are done in a write only manner which doesn’t always lend itself to the smoothest or best written items.

This lack of grammar/spelling/flow certainly isn’t done on purpose and if I catch myself I try to correct it. However, for this blog in particular, it all depends on how busy I am with other things. That isn’t an excuse, just an explanation. I am not trying to teach anyone how to be a better writer or speaker and I am not offended or bothered if someone says “Hey your writing sucks!” The goal is simply to offer my opinions and things I have worked out technically. I am happy to do this whether anyone is out there reading it or not as it is as much a repository for me to go back and find things as it is for others to use.

That being said, I think someone who is actually being paid for the words being put together should conform to a slightly higher standard. I know I spent hours and hours writing, reading, rewriting, and rereading when making updates to Active Directory Third Edition and while writing the Exchange Chapter for the Windows Server Cookbook. I find that if someone is actually paying me I need to step up and give them what they paid for. An example of a chapter that is “all me” writing for money can be found in the ADAM chapter. That is about the best I can write and I am happy with it as people can understand what is being described.

I do want to clarify though that my gripes on the Tech Target article are not due to grammatical issues. Had Derek misspelled every other word and put commas in all of the wrong spots and missed commas in all of the right spots but his tech was spot on I wouldn’t have said a word. The issue was and is and has been for some time that the tech was all pretty bad coupled with poor reading to make it even worse. It calls into question, at least for me, the level of technical review that is done by Tech Target; do they just accept anything anyone writes as gospel?

I am not expecting them to be 100% accurate, no one can do that, I certainly know there are issues still in the Active Directory Third Edition. I lived by the premise of fix more than I break and I know I lived up to that. I do think however, that a small five or so paragraph article has a far higher potential to be error free than an entire 800 page book.

I know folks that absolutely refuse to read Tech Target because of the quality of some of the writing. That sucks for the Tech Target folks because I think they generally do a decent job and I know several of the other contributors and often exchange emails with them on a variety of topics. The problem is that if you read things and know them to be wrong, it is tough to trust the other content that maybe you don’t know so well and what is the point of only reading content you already know? If just one single person gets the point into their head to question what is written in those articles, then I feel good.

My final thought on this is another point that Tech Target editors should consider. How many people wouldn’t even consider writing for Tech Target because they don’t want to be associated with writers like Derek? If you are technically literate, you generally want to be associated with others that are similar and eschew contact or any association with those who are not. There are publications and venues that I have previously written for that I stopped writing for because I stopped respecting the publication or venue. If asked to write for Tech Target it would be tough for me to say yes because I wouldn’t be comfortable having my writing sitting next to Derek’s writing with us both considered as AD Experts.

joe