Haunted manuals lightning talk

I gave a lightning #WriteTheDocs in Portland, and in this post I share the recording and my slide deck.

https://rinsemiddlebliss.com/posts/2025-05-16-haunted-manuals/

#TechnicalWriting

Just a couple of tickets left now for my Writing design systems documentation session at 10am-1pm next Thursday, 29 May.

If you're available and want to learn how to create docs people can find, understand and use, I'd love to have you.

Tell your friends!

https://bit.ly/4j2rW2D

#UXWriting #WriteTheDocs #DesignSystems

I impulsively signed up for a lightning talk at #WriteTheDocs today. To my surprise, I got chosen and so prepared a 5 minute version of my Haunted Manuals series over lunch and presented it. I had a lot of fun! Maybe I’ll actually finish the blog post series this year. https://rinsemiddlebliss.com/posts/2023-08-11-haunted-manuals/

Day 2 of providing live captioning at #writethedocs. #wtd @whitecoatcaptioning

So excited to be captioning #writethedocs for the 7th year in a row! 🥳 @whitecoatcaptioning @writethedocs

Doors are officially open here at our Portland #WriteTheDocs conference! 🎉 Get ready for two days of insightful talks, collaboration, and connection. Individual talks are followed by 10 minutes of Q&A, so bring your curiosity and your questions!

Today’s speakers: Rachel Rigdon, Yanjie Niu, Holly Mickelson, Stephanie Fuller, Janine Chan, Ravind Kumar, Manny Silva

More resources can be found on our Attendee Guide: https://www.writethedocs.org/conf/portland/2025/attendee-guide/ #WTDPortland2025

Anyone attending the #WriteTheDocs online conference today? (today for me, tomorrow for some of you)

Hike in Portland with #WriteTheDocs on Saturday. This view from Pittock Mansion ain't half bad. Glad we had a nice day for it.

I'm heading to #WriteTheDocs tomorrow, and I'm starting to get excited! Had to skip last year for Reasons, but I'm back and better than ever! I'm planning to do the Writing Day, the Hike, the whole enchilada.

Who else is going?

📝 Getting ready for this week’s Portland conference, and have a question? We may have just answered it in our News! Head to the link below for the FAQ scoop including how to participate, important links, and more. We’re also excited to announce that we’re opening up our Monday Unconference schedule and are accepting Lightning Talk submissions beginning today.

https://www.writethedocs.org/conf/portland/2025/news/welcome-portland-2025/

#writethedocs

I managed to wrangle the budget to fund me and 2 other writers on my team to come to #WriteTheDocs in Portland in person and we are all very hyped. It’s my second time attending in person (I think? Lots online. Time is a blur), but the first for the other two.

It’s the last day to submit your Writing Day project, and be featured on our blog! In just 11 days, our Portland conference kicks off on May 4th with opportunities to collaborate, contribute to open-source projects, and improve documentation together.

Submit your project by the end of the day, and we’ll include it on the website: https://www.writethedocs.org/conf/portland/2025/writing-day/

You’ll be in great company.

#WriteTheDocs #CollaborativeWriting #OpenSourceDocs

I liked watching Andrea Kao’s FOSS Backstage talk, particularly the way Andrea talked about the word “content”: it doesn't just diminish the work, it also diminishes the people do the work. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lmwpPyrrPdY

I took some longer notes here: https://ddbeck.com/notes/diminishing-content/ #WriteTheDocs

Swing by DeveloperHub’s booth at WTD! Whether you want to master building world-class docs or prove you’re the ultimate technical writing champ in our Technical Writing Olympics, we’ve got something for you. Oh, and did we mention? You could win a pair of Beats earphones! 🎧🔥

Get your ticket: https://www.writethedocs.org/conf/portland/2025/

#writethedocs

Ever wondered how beforeEach works in unit test frameworks? Check out our new lifecycle diagram!

https://qunitjs.com/lifecycle/

People generally guess right when it comes to ordering, so why a diagram?

We want to show that the order is guaranteed, and showcase what's possible when you depend on it.

Thanks to FND, Jan, and NullVoxPopuli for improving and promoting this work! H/T @FND @simulo @nullvoxpopuli

#qunit #WriteTheDocs #TechnicalWriting #SoftwareDocumentation #documentation #TDD

We’re excited to announce that ReadMe is one of our wonderful sponsors at Write the Docs Portland. 🙌
ReadMe transforms static API docs into interactive developer hubs. Find them at their booth May 5-6.

Buy tickets: https://www.writethedocs.org/conf/portland/2025/

#writethedocs

We are excited to announce our Keystone sponsor - Mintlify! 💫
Mintlify helps you create beautiful documentation that converts users.
💡 Visit them at their booth throughout the WTD weekend.

Tickets available: https://www.writethedocs.org/conf/portland/2025/

#writethedocs

A pic I took from the top of #Revolution Hall, at the #WriteTheDocs #Portland conference last year.

Until today, I've remained publicly silent about my attendance at this conference because ... all in all, it was a major letdown.

Here (and here) I'll tell you why.

Conference started off well enough. A self-proclaimed "extrovert" got up on stage and vomited some baloney-and-white bread about how she was there to represent #Nginx. And that Nginx was there for no other reason than to have her be their representative, from what I recall of her stage presentation.

"I'm an extrovert, if you don't know who to talk to, come talk to me" she said.

Days go by, and all of the conference is very narrow on like, a very narrow slice of technology-related things, I felt it was lacking some broader perspectives of what my career -- Technical Writing -- was all about.

And I did not plan to give a lightning talk, but when I woke up the last day of the conference again thinking about how there had been way too much conflation of the words "technology" and "technical", I wanted to speak up for my career.

The conference was making the #DigitalDivide much much bigger and wider, which is not what conferences are supposed to do. Thus, I did not ignore my pressing intuition that I should attempt to speak up for the young talent present -- maybe not in these "exact" words, but you get the gist of the idea:

NO, you don't need a god-damn Macbook to be a technical writer... not all technical writing is about computer-related things.

A lightning talk is short, very brief overview and allowing a speaker to introduce their area of expertise.

So while the conference organizers thought this was A-OK for the white supremacist, Nginx "extrovert" to tell people to come talk to her, it was NOT OKAY for someone whose ancestors were there first?

Yeah, that snooty white supremacist who was put "in charge" of the conference talks did what white supremacists do,

✅ pretended like I don't exist,
✅ communicated how much more "important" her extroversion is than my idea for a talk
✅ that I should not have been there and should "go away"

After the talk was rejected, I approached her and asked to retrieve the document I'd prepared asking to give a lightning talk. A copy of that that Lightning Talk Submission document is included on this server.

🌩️ ⚡

"I'm #auditing for the documentation trail of my #documentation I told her.

She looked startled, hum-hawed for a bit, evaded direct answer, and I could see panic in her eyeballs behind her glasses. When she finally came up with the answer that she thought would make me go away.

She told me it was shredded.

LOL, she just happened to find the shredder in that huge building and dispose of all evidence?

Within 3 minutes of being rejected, she told me she'd shredded all the lightning talk submission papers.

SUCH A #LIAR.

And I told her: "Oh, good thing I took a picture of it".

*10 years before the year of this story, I was an approved speaker (not a Lightning talk but a full-fledged conference talk) at WTD Portland.

A pic I took on the streets of #Portland
# 363 days ago, area within walking distance of #Revolution Hall.

I've remained publicly silent on my #WriteTheDocs conference attendance last year because it was .... a shitty conference.

And today I'll tell you why it was a shitty conference.

There was a self-proclaimed "extrovert" who got up on stage and vomited bullshit about how she was representing #Nginx.

I did not plan to give a talk, but when I woke up the last day of the conference, I really had this pressing intuition that I should speak up for the talent that was maybe intimidated ... that NO, you don't need a fucking Macbook to be a technical writer... not all technical writing is about computer-related things.

But then did I find out ... what that Nginx "extrovert" was really there to do was be the shithead #censoring the indigenous voice that wanted to get on stage and tell everybody that not all #TechnicalWriting has to be about #technology.

That snooty white supremacist bitch who was "in charge" of the conference talks rejected this talk.

After the talk was rejected, I asked to retreive this document, as I told her I was auditing the documentation trail....

She hum-hawed for a bit, evaded direct answer, and I could see panic in eyeballs behind her glasses when she finally came up with the answer that she thought would make me go away.

She told me it was shredded. LOL, she just happened to find the shredder in that building and dispose of all evidence.

Within 3 minutes of being rejected, she told me she shredded all the lightning talk submission papers.

SUCH A #LIAR.

And I told her: "Oh, good thing I took a picture of it".

In the course, you'll learn how to:

- understand and prioritise your readers
- name and organise your documentation
- make documentation clear and easy to read
- review and test documentation

Let me know if you have any questions, and please share far and wide!

#DesignSystems #WriteTheDocs