See, I was around when all those first FAQs were done up, as concatenated messages, dumped in a directory.
They were done precisely because the list maintainers didn’t want to be bothered explaining anything about the list culture and rules and if a user didn’t slog through the FAQ it was officially their own fault. My other favourite acronym from the time was RTFM.
Part of not wanting to be bothered was not wanting to bother organizing the information.
But the FAQs did have critical information in them.
Fast forward to the website where the critical information might still be trussed up and hidden in the FAQs. Of those sites where it is, though shouldn’t that beg the question “So what’s all that other stuff you call content, then?”
FAQs are a crutch for people who don’t or won’t organize their content.
Chris Lawson
See, I was around when all those first FAQs were done up, as concatenated messages, dumped in a directory.
They were done precisely because the list maintainers didn’t want to be bothered explaining anything about the list culture and rules and if a user didn’t slog through the FAQ it was officially their own fault. My other favourite acronym from the time was RTFM.
Part of not wanting to be bothered was not wanting to bother organizing the information.
But the FAQs did have critical information in them.
Fast forward to the website where the critical information might still be trussed up and hidden in the FAQs. Of those sites where it is, though shouldn’t that beg the question “So what’s all that other stuff you call content, then?”
FAQs are a crutch for people who don’t or won’t organize their content.