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And here I thought it was a slow summer.
> From: xerxes 
> Judging from Mike, Donovan's, and Mark's replies, it seems I may have
> touched a nerve.  Good.
> 
> I agree there should be a division of labor, but that does not mean
> feather-bedding.  The technology of automation is good enough that minor
> production chores can be handed off to most (not all) writers,  IF the
> editors and production chief set-up such a system.  Of course, setting-up
> such a system will ruffle feathers.  Some folks will get downsized. 
Others
> will have to learn a new skill or two.

Most organizations prefer to keep their writers writing, much as farmers
prefer to keep their cows producing milk. No matter that the cows can be
trained to pull a harrow, the profit lies in their producing raw milk. A
writer's time is best spent working on stories, not sweating the details of
production.

> At 9:01 PM 8/27/96, Mike McLeod wrote:
> >Let the writers write, the artists create and the packages package.
That's
> >the best way to get high-volume Web publishing done.
> 
> Is it?  Can you back this assertion with comparison studies?  Or are you
> asking for a continuation of wishful thinking....?

I've no doubt that comparison studies don't exist, since most high-volume
operations are based on staffing on functional lines. It's the small shops
that mix functionality the most, I suspect.

Having run production in a couple of places, I can say that the best way to
do it is to create expertise in a few, automate the hell out of it, and
keep everybody else's hands off. Production tends to be deadline driven,
and staff that misses deadlines tends to be fired. I don't think an
editor-in-chief would look kindly on the suggestion that a staffer who is
an excellent writer be replaced because they're slow to lay out a page in
HTML.
 
> Donovan sez:
> 
> >I'd rather have writers working the telephones and worrying about the
> >writing end of things. If you want writers' output to drive production,
> >then work on setting it up so that File/New and File/Save and File/Save
As
> >do all the work.
> 
> Well, three menu commands might not be enough...but 7-12 might do it. 
The
> key is getting enough style templates written-off on by the editors and
> art/production chiefs to cover most situations.....then the writers do
not
> have to make too many choices......just a few mechanical issues that will
> not overly tax their creative sensibilities...... 8-)       This is not
> impossible, and will save time, steps, and money in the intermediate
term.

This approach creates a rigid, formal style of layout. A couple of weeks
and everything looks old, tediously familiar.
 
> The rice bowl problem is common to ALL MATURE ORGANIZATIONS.  Usually,
> private firms in competitive markets overcome these issues, ...... or go
> out of business.  But governments, and firms that have little effective
> competition can become intensely hide-bound, and leadership will offer
> every possible rationalization for maintaining status quo organization
and
> procedures---even when technology changes make old forms and structures
> utterly obsolete........do newspapers fall into this category?  You
decide.
> Does competition from outside the newspaper industry threaten papers?
> You decide.   Will news operations run by MS or Telcos emulate inflexibly
> the divisions of labor set up by papers 100 years ago?  You decide.

xerxes here makes a mistake common on the Internet: If it exists, it must
be ancient; if it's Net, it requires new. Today's production systems aren't
all that old. Keep in mind that the PC isn't all that old, and that HTML
and the Web are really just another way of setting type. The big change in
editorial production system design came from computerization. And that's
old hat nowadays. That the typesetting code is HTML instead of Atex is a
meaningless distinction when you're considering the desirability of
inserting the writing staff into the page layout and production process.
The fundamentals on which you design processes haven't changed just because
you're publishing on the Web. 

dw

Donovan White

Online Information Development and Design
dwhite@olinfo.com               (508) 597-5321

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To: xerxes@clark.net (xerxes)
cc: online-news@planetarynews.com
Subject: Re: unsolicited advice......  From: "Donovan White"  Date: Tue, 27 Aug 1996 23:22:10 -0400
How the Web Was Won
Subject: Re: unsolicited advice...... 
From: "Donovan White" 
Date: Tue, 27 Aug 1996 23:22:10 -0400

In-reply-to: Your message of "Tue, 27 Aug 1996 21:54:14 EDT."