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What? You believed that “Sayonara” post?

keep-calm-youve-been-prankedHello, friends! 🙂

If you didn’t figure it out by now, I’m not going anywhere. My post, “Sayonara, TechCommGeekMom,” was an April Fool’s Day prank. I was put up to the task by none other than Al Martine and Connie Giordano, editors of TechWhirl. They approached me with the idea to add an article to their annual April Fool’s Day edition of TechWhirl. It was actually Al’s idea for me to write a send-off for my blog, and hopefully, I succeeded in my first attempt at writing satire. The scary thing is, much of that article wasn’t that far-fetched! I wouldn’t mind having a PhD in either History or Tech Comm, working at a yarn store (I do know how to knit, and I actually do understand the differences between types of wool), or pursuing genealogy as a profession. The reality is that none of that is happening anytime soon, and I’m not giving up tech comm or this blog. (Although, it seems that my “demise” garnered many hits on my blog. I’m hoping that it’s because you’d all miss me!)

If anything, I’m more dedicated than ever to keep this little blog going.  It’s been quite the journey already, and with the all-time hits approaching the 20,000 mark, and over 600 curated and original posts here, I don’t want to lose momentum. In my eyes, I’m still growing this blog, and it’s still a baby.  Would I like to attain the kind of readership that someone like, say, Tom Johnson, has? Absolutely. Tom has a head start on me, having been a tech writer for a longer time, and also having kept a tech comm blog for a longer time. And that’s okay. Tom is totally cool, so if I can be like him in eight to ten years of growing my blog, I’m good with that. We’re not in competition anyway, as we don’t necessarily address the same things.  He’s also earned the top tech comm blogger title because he provides insightful and helpful information. Over time, I hope that I am providing that same kind of service. (Hey, I was just thrilled to death when he recognized me at the Intelligent Content Conference last month!)

So, no worries! I’m still here. I’m going to be continuing to write and curate information about blogging, technical writing, e-learning, m-learning, and any other cool tech-geek stuff that I can find that I feel is worth sharing. I’m always open to ideas on how to grow my blog, including having guest bloggers, discussions, polls–anything–to keep ideas fresh and discussions flowing. If you’d like to see a topic covered, let me know!

TechCommGeekMom continues to be built on the concept of creating a tech comm and e-learning community, where newbies like myself could converse with more experienced technical communicators in a relaxed and casual atmosphere, sort of like friends hanging out at the kitchen table at Mom’s house. In this case, it’s TechCommGeekMom’s table, so pull up a chair. I’m sure I’ve got some snacks around here somewhere.

Author:

Danielle M. Villegas is a technical communicator who currently employed at Cox Automotive, Inc., and freelances as her own technical communications consultancy, Dair Communications. She has worked at the International Refugee Committee, MetLife, Novo Nordisk, BASF North America, Merck, and Deloitte, with a background in content strategy, web content management, social media, project management, e-learning, and client services. Danielle is best known in the technical communications world for her blog, TechCommGeekMom.com, which has continued to flourish since it was launched during her graduate studies at NJIT in 2012. She has presented webinars and seminars for Adobe, the Society for Technical Communication (STC), the IEEE ProComm, TCUK (ISTC) and at Drexel University’s eLearning Conference. She has written articles for the STC Intercom, STC Notebook, the Content Rules blog, and The Content Wrangler as well. She is very active in the STC, as a former chapter president for the STC-Philadelphia Metro Chapter, and is currently serving on three STC Board committees. You can learn more about Danielle on LinkedIn at www.linkedin.com/in/daniellemvillegas, on Twitter @techcommgeekmom, or through her blog. All content is the owner's opinions, and does not reflect those of her employers past or present.

2 thoughts on “What? You believed that “Sayonara” post?

  1. Yours was the best prank of all. Written believably, too. If it wasn’t April 1st, I probably would have believed you.

    1. I’m glad you didn’t believe it, Craig! A few people did! As I said, it’s not a far stretch from what I would ideally be doing if money were no object and I had time on my hands. 😛 But the siren call of tech comm still lures me in, and I must follow…

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