RE: Legal text for review.

[Pat Costello <Patrick Costello Sun COM>]

believe me Kristin, I agree with you...I'm not defending the uppercasing...it's 
not my decision to use uppercasing...someone with legal clout needs to make a 
statement about this...it is not only a technical communication issue. 


Pat


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> Subject: RE: Legal text for review.
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> 
> I've just recently joined the GNOME documentation project (about when the
> discussion of the legal statement started).  I'm fairly familiar with the
> GNOME Style Guide, as I have reviewed my colleagues documents for adherence
> to GNOME style.  I guess my main argument against using all capital letters
> for the legal statements is that it goes against accepted documentation
> practices. Even the GNOME Style Guide states (in the section on "Grammar
> and Usage Guidelines for GNOME Documentation) that capitalization should
> not be used for emphasis.
> 
> All caps text is difficult to read, and, as several other people have
> mentioned, it connotes screaming at the reader.  When text is in all
> capital letters, it appears as a big block.  Readers are unable to quickly
> distinguish one letter or word from another, so they generally don't read
> the text at all.  If the concern of the legal team is that people won't
> read the legal statement unless it is in all capital letters, I think they
> will be achieving the opposite effect.
> 
> While I understand the origin of capital letters for legal statements, I
> don't think we should be looking to ancient Rome to justify our
> documentation practices.  Modern literature on technical communication
> would tell us that the importance of text is demonstrated by headings or
> its placement on the page.  I understand the need to protect writers and
> the corporations that employ them with effective legal statements, but,
> since informing the reader is the first goal of documentation, I don't
> think using antiquated documentation techniques serves any purpose.  We
> certainly can't ask other writers to adhere to the Style Guide if the GNOME
> User's Guide doesn't adhere to it.   I look forward to working with this
> team in the future, I appreciate you listening to my opinion
> 
> Thanks,
> Kristin
> 
> ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
> Kristin Thomas
> Linux Information Development
> Linux Technology Center
> Ph. (512) 838-4546
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