[Yaesu] Operator's manuals today

[A10382]

The 'level' that manuals are written for may have a lot to do with who
writes them.

Many companies with diversified markets (technical and consumer) have
centralized the 'tech writing' functions.  And there are very few product
engineers in the centralized areas - they are just to expensive to 'waste
writing manuals'.

I agree --  many companies have dumbed down all of their user manuals to the
level of consumer who buys CD players, cordless phones, and stereo gear.
The cartoon-like instructions says it all.

Their measure of the effectiveness is sometimes nothing more than the number
of calls to customer service.. nothing more.
======
73, Frank

 ._._.


----- Original Message -----
From: "John Geiger" <johngeig@yahoo.com>
To: <icom@mailman.qth.net>; <yaesu@mailman.qth.net>;
<kenwood@mailman.qth.net>
Sent: Monday, March 01, 2004 5:03 PM
Subject: [Yaesu] Operator's manuals today


Has anyone else noticed a change in the level that
Operator's manuals are written at today?  I have
recently picked up a few older pieces of equipment
here and there, and the manuals from 15-20 years ago
are a world of difference from todays.

The older manuals would first thank you for purchasing
the equipment, and had circuit descriptions, block
diagrams, alignment procedures sometimes, and were
generally written at a high level.

Todays manuals look like they are written for the
under 70 IQ crowd.  They have cartoon figures.  They
usually have a "your first QSO" section which really
insults your intelligence.  It is written like we
wouldn't know how to turn on a radio, tune in a
frequency, and push the mic button without being
guided through it step by step.  There are no circuit
descriptions, alignment procedures, or block diagrams
anymore.

Now part of this might be cost, in that the
manufacturers want to cheapen the cost of manuals and
save all of that stuff for the service manual, but I
also wonder if this is saying something about the
competency of hams today versus in years past.  If it
has changed that much, the last thing we need to do is
make the licensing procedures any easier.

Just an interesting observation.

73s John NE0P


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