I started reading Kristina Halvorson's Content Strategy for the Web. It's new this year, copyright 2010.
Professionally, I spent my youth in the world of print publishing. I recognized right away that the Web was another way of publishing. I learned how to create websites so I could self-publish. I assumed, wrongly, that the publishing process for the Web would be pretty much the way it was for print.
Halvorson's cry that Web content should be treated like print content—with a respected process and an editor-in-chief—is the one voice I've ever heard that supports my own instincts—instincts that kicked in as soon as I saw Web pages with words on them all those years ago.
A few years back, I was a content developer building a practice within a user-centered design team. The team served as an in-house consulting and creative group for the ecommerce portion of a very large business. I've witnessed the disrespect content has suffered in Web era. And, for the first time, someone feels the same pain.
I read the second chapter, "Problem: Why Does Web Content Mostly Suck?," thinking, "Where was this book when I really needed it?" Everything from poor understanding about content on the part of user experience coworkers to having to rewrite four-dollar Web content that managers thought would save time and money. It's all there in Halvorson's second chapter.
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