I was a Tech Pubs judge and coordinator for the Australia Chapter the past 3 years (not this year though). We received some 23 entries in one of these years just for Tech Pubs alone! Not bad for a Chapter that spans a continent and only has about 60 members who never meet. (To get some idea of the scope and number of entries, take a look at the results from the past few years: http://stc-aus.org.au/competitions_results.htm. This comp has only been going for maybe 5 or 6 years.)
I've entered the Australia Chapter Online Comp a few times (again, not this year).
Being a judge and an entrant is definitely a win-win for me. As an entrant, I get feedback on my work from peers (which, as a lone writer, is often very hard to come by!). The judges see things that I haven't seen - usually because as the lone writer I'm too close to it. I've used that feedback to improve not only the doco it referred to, but also as guidelines for all my doco. Of course, you can take or leave any judge's comment! But it is defnitely worth the price of entering just to get that sort of peer evaluation.
As a judge, I found it enlightening to read and review the work of others. Some entries I would never have seen under normal circumstances as they were proprietary to an organisation; others surprised me for the sheer beauty of their design and layout (the words were usually good too!). I got lots of great ideas and inspiration from some of the entries. Of course, the downside was that there were some entries that were borderline disgraceful... poor (or no) editing, illogical flow, writing that sucked (can't put it any other way!). Fortunately, there weren't too many of those. However, despite that, the entrants got feedback - the good, the bad, and the downright ugly. And the feedback was always written in a constructive way.
My Aussie 2 cents worth...
Rhonda
Rhonda Bracey
http://www.cybertext.com.au
AuthorIT Certified Consultant
-----Original Message-----
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] on behalf of Martinek, Carla
Sent: Mon 11/6/2006 11:00 PM
To: [email protected]
Subject: [TCP] STC Competition
Just wondering...
Anyone else out there participating and/or judging in the STC
competition? We've got several entries this year, plus three of our
team are also working as judges.
This is my third year judging, and second year participating. I've
found it to be a win-win situation -- I get to see other people's docs
and maybe pick up some good ideas from them (and sometimes learn what
NOT to do) and we get feedback on our entries.
Carla Martinek
cmartinek|zebra|com
"Get Your Grammar Right"
"Live in the active voice, not the passive. Think more about what you
make happen than about what happens to you.
"Live in the indicative mood, rather than the subjunctive. Be concerned
with things as they are, rather than as they might be.
"Live in the present tense, facing the duty at hand without regret for
the past or worry over the future.
"Live in the first person, criticizing yourself rather than finding
fault with others.
"Live in the singular number, caring more for the approval of your own
conscience than for the applause of the crowd.
"And if you want a verb to conjugate, you cannot do better than to take
the verb, 'to love.'"
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