social web for tech comm, stc march 2013
DESCRIPTION
In a world where readers simply expect websites to offer well-connected experiences, technical documentation teams must consider the possibilities now available to us through collaborative means. Having worked with blogs, wikis, open source software, and social networking techniques, I want to share what I’ve learned about documentation as conversation. Through my work with the OpenStack project, I have further refined my approach to technical content strategy with collaborative, community methods. My presentation shares the methods we use with OpenStack, the ways my thinking has changed, pitfalls to avoid, and measurements that help refine the strategy.TRANSCRIPT
![Page 1: Social web for Tech Comm, STC March 2013](https://reader035.vdocuments.mx/reader035/viewer/2022070313/5549e378b4c90518488b4915/html5/thumbnails/1.jpg)
Conversation and Community
Social Media, Social Networking, and Social Relevance in Tech Comm
Anne [email protected]
Society for Technical Communication
HoustonMarch 2013
![Page 2: Social web for Tech Comm, STC March 2013](https://reader035.vdocuments.mx/reader035/viewer/2022070313/5549e378b4c90518488b4915/html5/thumbnails/2.jpg)
I believe in community
Flickr: seier+seier
![Page 3: Social web for Tech Comm, STC March 2013](https://reader035.vdocuments.mx/reader035/viewer/2022070313/5549e378b4c90518488b4915/html5/thumbnails/3.jpg)
I am… a Content Stacker
OpenStack – Open Source Cloud Computing
Rackspace – Fanatical Support in all we do
![Page 4: Social web for Tech Comm, STC March 2013](https://reader035.vdocuments.mx/reader035/viewer/2022070313/5549e378b4c90518488b4915/html5/thumbnails/4.jpg)
Our hero
Not always a technical writer
Wanting to make an impact▪ 72% of companies
use social technologies
▪ Writers are user advocates
▪ Need a plan and execution
![Page 5: Social web for Tech Comm, STC March 2013](https://reader035.vdocuments.mx/reader035/viewer/2022070313/5549e378b4c90518488b4915/html5/thumbnails/5.jpg)
Welcome to now
Never before have we had tools for media, networking, and relevance that help us meet our goals
How do we harness the power of the social web for documentation?
![Page 6: Social web for Tech Comm, STC March 2013](https://reader035.vdocuments.mx/reader035/viewer/2022070313/5549e378b4c90518488b4915/html5/thumbnails/6.jpg)
Flickr: thegentles
Guess what? I have ideas.
![Page 7: Social web for Tech Comm, STC March 2013](https://reader035.vdocuments.mx/reader035/viewer/2022070313/5549e378b4c90518488b4915/html5/thumbnails/7.jpg)
What’s the cloud?
Self-Service, Prorated Supercomputing Fun!http://open.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/11/01/self-service-prorated-super-computing-fun/
Your mission: “make all the public domain (New York Times) articles from 1851–1922 available free of charge” but “each article is actually composed of numerous smaller TIFF images”
Your solution: To the cloud! Rented resources: “churned through all 11
million articles in just under 24 hours using 100 EC2 instances, and generated another 1.5TB of data to store in S3”
![Page 8: Social web for Tech Comm, STC March 2013](https://reader035.vdocuments.mx/reader035/viewer/2022070313/5549e378b4c90518488b4915/html5/thumbnails/8.jpg)
What’s OpenStack?
Open Source Cloud Computing for all organizations
Community-built with a global collaboration of developers and cloud deployers with open development
Apache2 licensed code Open design process with an
in-person meeting every six months
![Page 9: Social web for Tech Comm, STC March 2013](https://reader035.vdocuments.mx/reader035/viewer/2022070313/5549e378b4c90518488b4915/html5/thumbnails/9.jpg)
Goals (Big, Hairy, Audacious) Increase OpenStack adoption by driving usage
and deployments – I was the first point of contact for AT&T’s cloud entry.
Provide OpenStack support with docs and comments. In fact, docs.openstack.org gets about 10,000 unique visitors a week.
Be strategic, collaborative, and open with documentation. (That’s the BHAG!) I’ve bet my career on this approach.
Provide truth and trust. Hard as you might think with fast-moving code.
Achieve business objectives for multiple companies in the OpenStack ecosystem.
![Page 10: Social web for Tech Comm, STC March 2013](https://reader035.vdocuments.mx/reader035/viewer/2022070313/5549e378b4c90518488b4915/html5/thumbnails/10.jpg)
OpenStack docs
docs.openstack.org/install for deployers
docs.openstack.org/run for cloud administrators and architects
docs.openstack.org/ops for cloud operators
api.openstack.org for REST API developers
docs.openstack.org/developer for Python developers
![Page 11: Social web for Tech Comm, STC March 2013](https://reader035.vdocuments.mx/reader035/viewer/2022070313/5549e378b4c90518488b4915/html5/thumbnails/11.jpg)
Definitions in context
Social media
Social networking
Social relevance
Sharing content, feedback loops, discussions, and destinations
Gather information by interacting with your audience and users
Collaboration, resource sharing, sharing goals
![Page 12: Social web for Tech Comm, STC March 2013](https://reader035.vdocuments.mx/reader035/viewer/2022070313/5549e378b4c90518488b4915/html5/thumbnails/12.jpg)
Meeting the challengesFlickr: marc_smith
![Page 13: Social web for Tech Comm, STC March 2013](https://reader035.vdocuments.mx/reader035/viewer/2022070313/5549e378b4c90518488b4915/html5/thumbnails/13.jpg)
Social media: lessons learned
![Page 14: Social web for Tech Comm, STC March 2013](https://reader035.vdocuments.mx/reader035/viewer/2022070313/5549e378b4c90518488b4915/html5/thumbnails/14.jpg)
Comments and workflows
Close the loop Track doc bugs
that are reported in the comments
Flickr: myklroventine
![Page 15: Social web for Tech Comm, STC March 2013](https://reader035.vdocuments.mx/reader035/viewer/2022070313/5549e378b4c90518488b4915/html5/thumbnails/15.jpg)
Commenting tools
Personas Commenters Readers Moderators Administrators
![Page 16: Social web for Tech Comm, STC March 2013](https://reader035.vdocuments.mx/reader035/viewer/2022070313/5549e378b4c90518488b4915/html5/thumbnails/16.jpg)
Comments and experience
Why not mobile first or mobile only?
Consider immersive experiences
Consider when and where you search – from your phone?
Responsive web design examples: http://mediaqueri.es/
![Page 17: Social web for Tech Comm, STC March 2013](https://reader035.vdocuments.mx/reader035/viewer/2022070313/5549e378b4c90518488b4915/html5/thumbnails/17.jpg)
Comments and translation
Comment in their language
Build communities locally
Think: is English the “source” or another language?
![Page 18: Social web for Tech Comm, STC March 2013](https://reader035.vdocuments.mx/reader035/viewer/2022070313/5549e378b4c90518488b4915/html5/thumbnails/18.jpg)
Categories of comments
Many comments at once to gain further understanding
Pointing out typos or small errors in code
Want specific examples and specific help
Request for a particular feature
Flickr: theilr
![Page 19: Social web for Tech Comm, STC March 2013](https://reader035.vdocuments.mx/reader035/viewer/2022070313/5549e378b4c90518488b4915/html5/thumbnails/19.jpg)
Social networking: lessons learned
![Page 20: Social web for Tech Comm, STC March 2013](https://reader035.vdocuments.mx/reader035/viewer/2022070313/5549e378b4c90518488b4915/html5/thumbnails/20.jpg)
BE HELPFUL, SHARE LISTEN, MONITOR
![Page 21: Social web for Tech Comm, STC March 2013](https://reader035.vdocuments.mx/reader035/viewer/2022070313/5549e378b4c90518488b4915/html5/thumbnails/21.jpg)
INFORM RESPOND
![Page 22: Social web for Tech Comm, STC March 2013](https://reader035.vdocuments.mx/reader035/viewer/2022070313/5549e378b4c90518488b4915/html5/thumbnails/22.jpg)
Networking and data
Listen where users are; select channels
Mine data gold Daily/weekly blog
searches Career- and job-
related searches Get to know
community content members Anne Gentle
![Page 23: Social web for Tech Comm, STC March 2013](https://reader035.vdocuments.mx/reader035/viewer/2022070313/5549e378b4c90518488b4915/html5/thumbnails/23.jpg)
Social relevance: lessons learned
![Page 24: Social web for Tech Comm, STC March 2013](https://reader035.vdocuments.mx/reader035/viewer/2022070313/5549e378b4c90518488b4915/html5/thumbnails/24.jpg)
Slogging through the slushpile
Think like an acquisition editor
Everyone’s a writer (but not all of them have a coach)
Files as the basis are key to treading docs like code
Flickr: gruntzooki
![Page 25: Social web for Tech Comm, STC March 2013](https://reader035.vdocuments.mx/reader035/viewer/2022070313/5549e378b4c90518488b4915/html5/thumbnails/25.jpg)
Timing and cadence
Originally had three month release cycles
Design Summit in-person meeting April and October
Now six month release cycles with milestone releases
Flickr: plenty
![Page 26: Social web for Tech Comm, STC March 2013](https://reader035.vdocuments.mx/reader035/viewer/2022070313/5549e378b4c90518488b4915/html5/thumbnails/26.jpg)
Contributors and newbies
Devs write for devs Admins write for
admins This is a complete
turnaround for me Some people can
only review (and it’s not worthwhile to convince them to write)
Flickr: kholkute
![Page 27: Social web for Tech Comm, STC March 2013](https://reader035.vdocuments.mx/reader035/viewer/2022070313/5549e378b4c90518488b4915/html5/thumbnails/27.jpg)
Marathon, results over time
• 66% Site visitors stay instead of leaving
• 100 Doc patches and reviews a month
• 10,000 unique visitors a week
• 6 months before commenters answered each other
Flickr: dno1967b
![Page 28: Social web for Tech Comm, STC March 2013](https://reader035.vdocuments.mx/reader035/viewer/2022070313/5549e378b4c90518488b4915/html5/thumbnails/28.jpg)
Sprint, a book in a week
![Page 29: Social web for Tech Comm, STC March 2013](https://reader035.vdocuments.mx/reader035/viewer/2022070313/5549e378b4c90518488b4915/html5/thumbnails/29.jpg)
Book Sprint Videohttp://youtu.be/lYfHEy6E2n0
![Page 30: Social web for Tech Comm, STC March 2013](https://reader035.vdocuments.mx/reader035/viewer/2022070313/5549e378b4c90518488b4915/html5/thumbnails/30.jpg)
Amazing stories
• Logged doc bug in afternoon, came in to a fix the next day
• Glossary out of “nowhere” from a wiki page starting point
• Translation workflow in six months
![Page 31: Social web for Tech Comm, STC March 2013](https://reader035.vdocuments.mx/reader035/viewer/2022070313/5549e378b4c90518488b4915/html5/thumbnails/31.jpg)
Analytics: readers
Bam. Site Launch.
![Page 32: Social web for Tech Comm, STC March 2013](https://reader035.vdocuments.mx/reader035/viewer/2022070313/5549e378b4c90518488b4915/html5/thumbnails/32.jpg)
Analytics: contributors
Doh. Release date.
Hey! Release date!
![Page 33: Social web for Tech Comm, STC March 2013](https://reader035.vdocuments.mx/reader035/viewer/2022070313/5549e378b4c90518488b4915/html5/thumbnails/33.jpg)
![Page 34: Social web for Tech Comm, STC March 2013](https://reader035.vdocuments.mx/reader035/viewer/2022070313/5549e378b4c90518488b4915/html5/thumbnails/34.jpg)
Play a role
Acquisition editor Web stats analyst Writing coach Project manager Bug
tracker/triager Editor Advocate Writer
![Page 35: Social web for Tech Comm, STC March 2013](https://reader035.vdocuments.mx/reader035/viewer/2022070313/5549e378b4c90518488b4915/html5/thumbnails/35.jpg)
Summary
Media: Encourage conversation Networking: Listen and learn Relevance: Build a team and
community Iterate repeatedly
![Page 36: Social web for Tech Comm, STC March 2013](https://reader035.vdocuments.mx/reader035/viewer/2022070313/5549e378b4c90518488b4915/html5/thumbnails/36.jpg)
We’re Hiring – rackertalent.com
![Page 37: Social web for Tech Comm, STC March 2013](https://reader035.vdocuments.mx/reader035/viewer/2022070313/5549e378b4c90518488b4915/html5/thumbnails/37.jpg)
Questions?
Anne [email protected]
@annegentle
www.facebook.com/conversationandcommunity
www.linkedin.com/in/annegentleFlickr: candelabrumelabrumdanse