Re: Rant continued from previous page (was Re: Another Word guru question)

["Mike Starr" <mike -at- writestarr -dot- com>]

I'm deeply sorry to hear about the incident you described. As I said in one 
of my previous posts on the topic, if I thought there was ANY possibility 
that serious harm or lethal results could occur, I'd approach these sorts of 
things with a lot more caution (and yes, in some circumstances, I might feel 
that it was important to include "Continued..." markings on tables). 
However, for the vast majority of documentation, I maintain they're a silly 
notion.

The target audiences for the documents I've created have almost always been, 
at a minimum, generally educated non-specialists. With that level of 
education I assume that the reader is astute enough to negotiate the 
document that I've carefully crafted whilst taking into consideration what 
they might reasonably be expected to know and understand. I respect my 
audience too much to treat them like they need to have their hands held and 
be led by the nose on every page. If I happen to create a document that 
might somehow need to be used by the booted and unhorsed, I'd adjust 
accordingly.

However, you bring up a point of how do we accommodate those cases where a 
single page of a document is somehow separated from the rest of the 
document. I'd suggest that if a single page were printed or photocopied, it 
probably wouldn't make much difference if the table in question had a 
continuation indicator... the reader probably wouldn't have access to the 
rest of the document anyway.

Another concept to consider (and I admit to not being totally sure where I 
stand on the issue) is the "Use as directed" approach. Merck or Pfizer or 
any number of pharmaceutical companies produce any number of medications 
that can have seriously harmful effects or even cause death if not used in 
an appropriate manner. They take responsibility for delivering them with 
instructions in the original packaging. Once the packaging is opened and the 
contents separated from the instructions, their liability ends. My 
libertarian inclinations say that at some point, the consumer/user must 
accept a minimum level of responsibility... manufacturers can only do so 
much to prevent accidents and can only be held accountable for the 
documentation AS DELIVERED.

I remember a number of years ago, a guy decided that it would be so much 
simpler to use his lawn mower to trim his hedge. He lifted it up and started 
trimming his hedge, somehow lost control of it and now is fully qualified 
for a position as harem guard. Was this a failure of the documentation or 
just another example of life in the shallow end of the gene pool? I'd 
suggest the latter.

Mike
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