April 2015 Archives

April 21, 2015May 15, 2015

Infrequently used but extremely critical information

Seattle at sunset from over Bainbridge Island

I just finished the refresher training for my Flight Instructor (CFI) certificate. This is the eighth time I’ve renewed it since my last check-ride. Yet, for some reason, this time seemed unusually focused on mishaps. Granted, the lessons focused mostly on avoiding them, and surviving them (when they couldn’t be avoided), but mishaps nonetheless.

This year, I had lessons on avoiding and surviving:

mishaps in the mountains
mishaps in helicopters
mishaps in seaplanes
mishaps while teaching student pilots
mishaps in bad weather

Then, as a break in training, I watched the Weather Channel’s “Why Planes Crash.”

Yeah, that was relaxing.

Yet, after all this, I can’t wait to get to the airport and go flying, again. I really enjoy flying so why focus on all this negativity?

So it won’t happen to me. I hope that I never need to apply any of this information, directly. At the same time, I hope to apply what I learned about these mishaps all the time–not just while flying.

Most of the mishap scenarios could be summed up as:

Failing to plan is planning to fail.

— Alan Lakein

Which applies to just about any aspect of life.

I’ve had a lot of flight training in the 40+ years I’ve spent hanging around airports. The bulk of it–70-80%, I’d guess–involved dealing with emergencies (the rest delt with how to avoid them in the first place). So far, fortunately, these emergency scenarios have only happened to me in training scenarios. While I have a story or two to tell about when things didn’t go exactly as planned, the vast majority of my flights were quite safe.

So, if the probability of an inflight emergency is very low, why spend a disproportionate time in training for them? Because, while they are very low-probability events (0%, ideally), they are very high-cost events.

Is it worth it to spend all that time training for something that is not likely to ever happen? You betcha!! I’m sure the people who fly with me would agree!

What does any of this have to do with technical writing? It’s like I posted in this post on in-flight reading material, some topics provide a little value many times, while other topics provide a great deal of value, but infrequently. The value of content that results, somehow, in a financial transaction is relatively easy to compute: subtract the cost of producing and promoting the content from the gain it provides. Computing the value of content that provides great value but only infrequently, much harder.

Like the flight training that’s kept me from having an accident, how do you measure the value of events (accidents, misunderstandings, errors, etc.) that have been averted or costs that have been avoided?

April 8, 2015October 20, 2015

Facebook, Twitter, Ham radio?

It turns out I’ve been a social media user (perhaps even somewhat of an expert) for almost 30 years, now. Time to update my resume.

According to this article, amateur radio (a.k.a. ham radio) is the original social media. Um, OK. Let’s compare and contrast…

The article cites these examples:

Talking to people in England and Australia
Using abbreviated words (e.g. BCNU = be seeing you in ham radio and when texting)
Providing communications during emergency situations
Using technology
Thousands (millions?) of people can hear/read what you send in an instant

OK. There’s no arguing that they have some things in common. In fact, ham radio (Morse code, to be specific) had a speed advantage over texting in a demonstration on the Jay Leno show some 10 years ago. This report from Indiana University had somewhat different results, however, so your mileage may vary–mine would be embarrassing, so I won’t even bring that into the discussion. But, to be fair, let’s look at some of the differences that the report from Indiana University illustrated, if not highlighted.

Ham radio requires a desk-mounted piece of equipment (and a long antenna that wasn’t shown), while texting requires a device that fits in your pocket
Ham radio is somewhat more inconvenient (see previous point)
Not shown, but you can send a text to many more people than you can send a ham-radio message
A text can be sent in English (or any other language that you can type on the keypad), while ham radio messages are coded in Morse code. (Granted, you can also speak over ham radio…like a phone, for example)

While they have some things in common, they are also different in many ways.

I have fun with ham radio and I’ve talked to far-away places. For the past two years, I’ve used it to support humanitarian work in eastern Honduras. That I can string up a wire and talk to someone in Brazil without any additional equipment beyond the radio that’s connected to the wire, never ceases to amaze me, but is it social media?

I’ll settle for calling it technical communications.

April 3, 2015

A day late and a click short

The other day, this little plastic piece broke causing my 9-year-old car to spray hot engine coolant all over the road and emit plumes of steam from under the hood. AAA rescued the car and a tow truck brought it home. Fortunately, the broken part was easily visible in the engine compartment and a quick search identified several options for purchasing a replacement.

As auto parts go, it looked like one of the easier to replace, but it broke on Monday and I wouldn’t be able to get to it until the weekend, which would inconvenience my wife and daughter who drive the car. So, I called my favorite auto mechanic, Accurate Auto Service, in Snohomish, who could (and did) fix it right away.

Problem solved. Which brings me to…

Yesterday. Facebook tried to add value to my browsing experience (and their bottom line) by showing me the ad in the photo.

Thanks, but no thanks.

They do this a lot, and while I understand how Facebook lives to sell ads, I’m not sure why they think that showing me something I looked for (and found) two-days earlier is something I might still be interested in. I’m sure they have the numbers to show this works enough to keep doing it, but it brings to mind some troubling implications:

What were they (i.e. their algorithm) thinking when they picked this ad? Is that how I really shop? (maybe) but more troubling still, what else do they know about me better than I do? Which leads to…
How were they watching (I know, tracking cookies and what not, but how far does that go? Are they watching me type this?)
What would I have thought if this had happened 10 years ago? 20 years ago? (There’s another blog post)
Why does this not bother me anymore? Are baby pictures and cute dog videos really that valuable to me?

How did I ever survive without Facebook there to show me baby pictures for the low, low price of being able to look over my shoulder when I do other things on the Internet? Truth be told, it’s really easier to just stop thinking and look at the cute baby pictures–and therein lies the real problem.