Industry Average Help Desk Support Costs

Envisioned by the folks at MindTouch, based on data from the 2010 HDI Customer Satisfaction Benchmarking Study.

Bad News For Lionbridge: Translators Rebel With Help From Social Media, Video

Meet The Future: 7th Grade Technology Blogger, Paid Intern, Entrepreneur — And Your Future Boss — Max Swisher

By Scott Abel, The Content Wrangler Internet TV host, technology writer, blogger and quality assurance tester Max Swisher knows more about technology than most adults I know. It comes naturally to him. And, it makes perfect sense to me. His parents are both involved in the technology industry. His idea of fun is mucking about in some HTML or launching a web project of one type or another. All this is pretty impressive, especially when one considers Swisher is also a seventh grade student. In this exclusive interview, I talked Read the full article…

Jane McGonigal on Game-Based Learning

The huge success of the Apple iPad is irrefutable. It’s dominance in the handheld computing market has had tremendous impact on mobile computing, app development, and digital publishing. But its biggest value may lie in its ability to deliver useful, interactive content to users when and where they need it. But the iPad (and the myriad clones attempting to compete with it) only get us half way there. What’s needed is content that is designed for mobile consumption, that takes full advantage of touch-screen functionality and that helps (not hinders) Read the full article…

Are You Content Strategy Material?

By Scott Abel, The Content Wrangler On April 15, 2011 I interviewed content strategy guru Rahel Anne Bailie of Intentional Design as part of a webinar series, sponsored by MindTouch. We talked about what it takes to be a good content strategist. We discussed what content strategy is (and what it isn’t), how a content life cycle can be used as a tool to help further refine a repeatable content creation, management, and delivery process, and what skills are needed if you want to become a content strategist. Unfortunately, we Read the full article…

Noz Urbina Interviews Ann Rockley About Content Integration

Intelligent content guru (and the “Mother of Content Management”) Ann Rockley will be one of the featured presenters at Congility 2011, May 24-26 in Gatwick, UK. The theme of this year’s event is Content Integration: Leveraging Standards to Improve Customer Experience. Content strategist Noz Urbina talks to Ann about the need for content standards and a content strategy in order to create positive customer experiences.

Intelligent Content: Rachel Lovinger and Rahel Bailie Talk Content Strategy

Ready For The World: Is Your Content Strategy Global Ready?

by Scott Abel, The Content Wrangler Move over cowboys. Once you’ve finished wrangling your content into a more intelligent format, the next thing up on your agenda is to figure out whether your content is global ready and, if not, what you can do about it. I’ve written a lot about intelligent content. Ann Rockley and Joe Gollner cover the topic from a strategic vantage point in An Intelligent Content Strategy for the Enterprise. For the uninitiated, intelligent content is content that is structurally rich, semantically aware, automatically discoverable, reusable, Read the full article…

25 Years of FrameMaker: Why This Product Still “Rocks” After A Quarter Of A Century

by Maxwell Hoffmann, Director, Document Globalization Practice at Globalization Partners International This month (April 2011) FrameMaker turns 25, just 3 months after the launch of a major new release, Adobe FrameMaker 10. Over the years, FrameMaker has attracted many nicknames, from “industrial strength publishing” to “Word on steroids.” Even phrases like “too good to be true” have been associated with the product. None of these monikers have ever accurately categorized or captured the essence of this dynamic product. I was employee number 66 at Frame Technology (the company that invented Read the full article…

Intelligent Content: Scott Abel Interviews Paul Trotter, Author-IT About Thinking Differently And The Future Of Technical Communication

Aging, Magic, Trivia, And Techy Topics Featured At Annual WritersUA Conference

by Cheryl Landes, Founder, Tabby Cat Communications The first WritersUA conference I attended was in 1996 in Seattle, when it was known as WinWriters. I was a guest, thanks to taking an advanced RoboHelp class from Neil Perlin in conjunction with the conference. Back then, the topics were on the cutting edge—with seemingly endless enthusiastic discussions about tips on using help authoring tools (HATs) and the future of online help. As a relatively novice help writer at the time, my head swam with information, but I learned a lot that Read the full article…

Infographic: The History of Graphic Design

[Source: Business Insider]

Google Reinvents Email – Introducing GMail Motion

Just in time for April Fools Day.

The Content Wrangler Interview With Jennifer Beaupre About acrolinx, Terminology Management and Content Quality

In this short video, Scott Abel, The Content Wrangler, interviews Jennifer Beaupre, Director of Global Marketing for acrolinx at the Intelligent Content 2011 Conference in Palm Springs, CA. We discuss the company’s flagship terminology and content quality software product, acrolinx IQ.