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September 1967 Electronics World
 Table
of Contents
Wax nostalgic about and learn from the history of early electronics. See articles
from
Electronics World, published May 1959
- December 1971. All copyrights hereby acknowledged.
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In this "Mac's
Service Shop" article entitled "Technical Writing," John Frye presents a
critical dialogue on technical journalism, where Mac contrasts self-aggrandizing
writers with true professionals who prioritize substance over style. The article
outlines the essentials of effective technical writing: originality, clarity,
proper organization, and the ability to inspire action, all while avoiding the
insertion of the author's personality between the reader and the subject. This
critique finds a parallel in the automotive journalism of the 1970s, as with
figures like "Mechanix Illustrated" magazine's Tom MacCahill. In his reader mail
columns, MacCahill often squandered valuable instructional space (IMHO) by
publishing off-topic, trivial, or inane reader questions and responding with
flippant or silly answers. This practice exemplifies the very failure Mac
describes, where the writer's desire to be entertaining or quirky undermines the
pedagogical mission, leaving readers with amusement instead of the serious,
useful technical information they sought. Otherwise, his on-topic technical
automotive-related articles were excellent. Mr. MacCahill (aka "Uncle Tom") is
widely considered the inventor of the "road test" columns on production cars.
Mac's Service Shop: Technical Writing
 By John T. Frye
Emitting a sudden grunt of distaste, Barney hurled the electronics magazine he
had been reading clear across the service shop. "I've had it with that so-called
technical writer," he announced to Mac, his employer. "The joker is so busy demonstrating
how devastatingly clever, witty, and cute he is that he has little time left for
his subject. I couldn't care less about the car he drives or his opinion of miniskirts!"
Mac grinned sympathetically as he loaded his pipe, a sure sign he intended taking
a break from the TV set he was aligning.
"He must belong to what my writing friend, Tom, calls 'the smart aleck cult,'
" Mac observed. "These writers try to project an amusing, egocentric, mildly obnoxious
personality as a substitute for hard work and research. They answer questions from
readers flippantly, being more interested in securing laughs than in supplying useful
information. These writers often make an amusing first impression on some readers,
but they don't wear well with the majority.
"The sad thing is they have simply gone too far in trying to make their writing
interesting for its own sake. Tom says all writing should be interesting in itself.
He quotes: 'No man can read for profit what he cannot read for pleasure'. But good
writing can be made highly readable and interesting through legitimate literary
arts without becoming facetious, insulting, or downright silly. When a tech writer
inserts his personality between the reader and the subject, he has gone too far
in trying to hold the reader's interest. Means has become an end in itself."
"You seem to put considerable store by what Tom says." "I do. He is a truly professional
tech writer who makes a darned good living with his typewriter because he prepared
himself to do just that. He made up his mind to write while still in high school
and studied for his profession in the best university journalism schools in the
country. He still reads constantly to improve his writing ability, and you will
find almost as many books on English composition and effective writing on his shelves
as you will technical electronics books. I know he has had several offers to write
fiction and for TV, but he has stuck chiefly to electronics because of his long
interest in this subject. He does occasionally do an article for a professional
writer's magazine, though, and that in itself bears testimony to his recognized
ability.
"For my part, I've been reading technical electronics articles and books for
better than a third of a century, and I have pretty definite ideas about what does
or does not constitute a good article.
"First, the subject matter should not be flyblown. It can present a new device,
spotlight a novel application of an old device, or cast additional light into shadowed
areas of electronics theory; but I don't want any tired old rehash of textbook material.
This comic is unrelated to the story, but was on the page. Its
theme is typical of the era, with the wife not fully understanding her husband's
interests.
"Second, I expect the article to be well organized. I want a beginning that quickly
outlines the subject to be covered and foreshadows the tone and depth of treatment
so that I don't have to read the whole article to tell if I want to read it. The
body of the article should develop the subject in an orderly easy-to-follow manner
without any confusing necessity for backtracking. The majority of the text and illustrations
should be concentrated in the areas of greatest need: on the most important and
hard-to-understand parts of the discussion. When the subject has been thoroughly
covered, the article should come to a prompt and definite end - not just peter out.
If the final sentence appears at the bottom of the page, I should know it is the
final sentence without having to turn the page to see.
"The article should not read as though written by a high school sophomore.
I expect it to be cast in clear, vigorous English devoid of clichés and verbosity.
Marks of punctuation should be used with the precision of an engineer designating
components of a prototype device. The punctuation should clearly and consistently
indicate the relationship of the various sentence elements. There should be no room
for suspicion that the author has punctuated 'by ear.'"
"The article need not sound as though written by Shakespeare, but it should have
a definite literary quality. Figures of speech, analogies, careful choice of words,
variation in sentence length, proper paragraphing - all these should be used to insure
clarity and enhance the readability. What's more, the article should be complete.
By that I mean a construction article should include all the information necessary
for the reader to duplicate the described device exactly from readily available
resources. Every statement or theory open to question should be backed up by quoted
authority or experimental data carefully described so that it may be duplicated.
"Finally, a good technical article should leave the reader with an urge to action.
A construction article should make him want to duplicate the device described. A
description of an exciting new device should make him want to obtain one for his
own use. Even a theory article should awaken a desire to perform experiments to
confirm the theory or to do more extensive reading along the same line. I consider
this evoking of enthusiasm the most important test of a technical article because,
if you stop to think about it, it embraces all the other requirements."
"You certainly have definite ideas about what a good technical article should
be - and I can't argue with any of your points," Barney admitted; "but what does
Tom have to say about the making of a good technical writer? What preparation does
a writer need to turn out the kind of articles you have just described?"
"Tom is most eloquent on that subject. He says good technical writing is first
'good' and then 'technical'. By that he means the possession of technical knowledge
is not enough to turn out first-class technical articles. Technical writing, he
says, is actually communication, and it is more closely related to teaching than
it is to engineering. A tech writer doesn't 'just happen' any more than an engineer
'just happens'.
"It follows, then, that the first thing a tech writer must do is learn to write
good, clear, simple prose. This ability, acquired only through diligent study and
constant practice, is not easy to come by. Many men never acquire it. The turgid
writing often seen in government releases bears proof. The authors of this tortured
prose would do well to heed Hemingway's reminder: 'Good writing is architecture,
not interior decorating'.
"Next the writer must acquire proficiency in handling the 'tools' of his profession.
He must master not only the mechanical aids, such as the typewriter, tape recorder,
and camera, but he must also learn to get the most out of an unabridged dictionary,
a set of encyclopedias, a thesaurus, Fowler's Modern English Usage, and the public
library. Knowing where and how to obtain needed information quickly and efficiently
is absolutely essential."
"Tom says that ideally the tech writer's technical knowledge should be acquired
through both study and experience. He must have - and use! - a good technical library
and read most of the technical publications in his chosen field. Also, unless his
writing is to take on a 'bookish' quality that will be immediately spotted and resented
by a practicing technician, he must be constantly using and experimenting with actual
equipment. Only this will give his writing that authentic 'this-guy-has-really-been-there'
flavor.
"At the same time, he must have sufficient contact with various classes of readers
to understand the technical limitations of each. Armed with this knowledge, he will
be prepared to write articles that will successfully bridge from what those readers
do know to what they want to know. In the writing trade, this matching of the writing
of a magazine article to the sophistication of the magazine's average reader is
called slanting, and it's done almost automatically by a good tech writer.
"Finally, the professional tech writer is a responsible person. He abhors publishing
an error because he knows that the reputations of the editor who bought his article
and the magazine that prints it are both being placed on the line right alongside
his own reputation. That's why he checks and double-checks every word he writes."
"Somehow I feel you don't think an engineer is a good technical writer."
"Not any more than I think a tech writer is a good engineer," Mac retorted with
a grin. "Actually, both are professionals in different fields, and in this modern
day of specialization it's rare to find a man who can master two professions. Some
of the dullest technical writing I know is found in professional technical journals
- the kind where the only reward received by the author is to see his article in
print.
"On the other hand, some of the best-written technical articles published recently
have appeared in such popular magazines as Time and Life. These articles, written
by highly paid professional writers, often are more easily understood
by technician as well as layman than are articles on the same subjects appearing
in many technical journals. Articles on laser beams, holographic photography, and
fluidics come to mind. The popular articles were better, not because of any basically
superior content, but because of smooth professional writing."
"I think one reason there is such a demand for good technical writing is that
the present generation has been accustomed to receiving information in attractive,
interesting form. The editor who thinks he can get by publishing dull, unimaginative
articles had better take a good long look at modern high - school math and physics
textbooks. They are a far cry from the dull, forbidding texts of yesteryear. In
these modem books every literary art is used to present knowledge in an attractive,
palatable form."
"Right you are, Barney," Mac said, knocking the dottle from his pipe and switching
on the sweep and marker generators. "Modern man's knowledge of himself, his environment,
and the physical laws controlling his universe has taken a tremendous spurt in the
past half century. In that brief span, his technical knowledge has far more than
doubled all he learned in the preceding centuries. In fact, this knowledge pouring
down from every side threatens to swamp him.
"But the professional technical writer voraciously attacks this flood of information
channeled to him through carefully cultivated contacts with R&D laboratories,
military research centers, and our great colleges and universities. He predigests
a tremendous amount of this raw information and then regurgitates the essence of
it in a form easily assimilated by those with less technical knowledge.
"Doing this well is a true profession; and I, for one, am glad to see these specialized
writers beginning to receive the recognition and reward they richly deserve."
Mac's Radio Service Shop Episodes on RF Cafe
This series of instructive
technodrama™
stories was the brainchild of none other than John T. Frye, creator of the
Carl and Jerry series that ran in
Popular Electronics for many years. "Mac's Radio Service Shop" began life
in April 1948 in Radio News
magazine (which later became Radio & Television News, then
Electronics
World), and changed its name to simply "Mac's Service Shop" until the final
episode was published in a 1977
Popular Electronics magazine. "Mac" is electronics repair shop owner Mac
McGregor, and Barney Jameson his his eager, if not somewhat naive, technician assistant.
"Lessons" are taught in story format with dialogs between Mac and Barney.
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