At the STC France Annual Conference in Paris 18 months ago, Tony Self suggested that a new generation of people entering the workforce will have a limited ability to read anything other than short texts. If he is right, and the future readers of our user assistance can't read as we do, how are we going to write for such an audience? In this session, Tony returns to the subject and proposes techniques that we can adopt to write for readers who cannot read.

The approaches to reach these new readers involve re-thinking the phrases and terms that we use. For example, surveys have shown that typical computer users don't know the difference between a browser and a search engine. New readers sometimes cannot spell the words they want to search for, so we have to cater for this deficiency in the design of our search. One study suggests that our message must be transmitted in 63 words, and we would have to develop new skills to work within such difficult constraints. At a much higher level, we also have to move away from writing content that requires "deep reading", and create content that suits "power browsing". This points towards the inclusion of more multimedia materials, and a move to visual work instructions and tutorials for procedure documentation. The challenges in writing for readers who can't or won't read are many, but these are challenges that we must as some point face up to.

STC France's new "Wake Up!" series is a great way to start your day! Join us for breakfast and an informal presentation by a leading industry professional - and still make it to the office for that mid-morning meeting!