Comparison of Manufacturer FAQ Sites and Fan Forums: DJ Forum Technical Analysis - Prof. W, Assignments of Technical Writing

Download Comparison of Manufacturer FAQ Sites and Fan Forums: DJ Forum Technical Analysis - Prof. W and more Assignments Technical Writing in PDF only on Docsity! Technical Analysis of Forums Date: 9/13/2004 To: Bill Hart-Davidson, WRA 320 Instructor From: John Phillips RE: DJ Forums Overview The genre I chose to do for my report is an analyisis on DJ fan forum sites in comparison to the manufacturers FAQ sites. In this document I will be discussing where information is produced between manufacturer sites of DJ equipment and fan forums on miscellaneous sites. There is a big difference between the two because the manufacturer sites depend more upon paper plans and product analysis rather than being hobbyists of the musical instruments and having more hands on experience. Creators of the technical sites and forums The authors of the fan forum sites are the fans themselves. On these forum sites, different people who use the DJ equipment trade questions and answers about technical problems they have while using the equipment. These sites are not limited to just questions and answers, it is also a platform for discussion about different pieces of music equipment. There is usually not just one single person that responds to all of the questions. At times the fans may get as many as 10 different people telling them ways to fix or improve problems they may be having. These forum sites, however, are not limited to just technical problems, they tend to offer advice on how to keep your equipment running smooth, or even teach you how to make modifications to them to make them perform better. Some of the information that you find on the fan forum sites maybe not be available on the manufacturer sites. All of the fans within the particular DJ forum are responsible for asking and answering each others questions, and it is up to the user asking to questions to decide which response they will use to answer the questions they may have. So in these forums the authors are highly visible in the sense that the forum is like a conversation board, and even though the reader may not personally know the ones who respond to him, they still converse and communicate back and forth. The head Webmaster, in order for the users to communicate, sets up the forum. Therefore it is up to the users and visitors of these fan sites to keep the forums alive and running. So all of the fans rely on their peers for help, and it works better this way because users are getting questions answered from other people who may have a lot more experience and know how to answer specific question. Another advantage of having these forums is that the users are not set to one particular brand of equipment, so if a user has different questions about different brands he can get all the answers right in front of his face, rather than having to go through a ton of different manufacturer sites. The layout and design of the fan forums are set up to look more user friendly and not have as much as a professional feel to them as much as the manufacturer sites. For the manufacturer FAQ sites, the authors tend to be technicians and engineers of a particular brand of equipment. This may range from a single technician, to a group of technicians that help produce and market the equipment. Therefore they take the full responsibility for answering frequently asked questions that Dj enthusiasts may have. The way they organize the sites, is that users will email 9/13/2004 Confidential 1 Technical DJ Forums questions to one of the technicians of the particular brand, and the technician will receive all of the questions of different users. They then will take the more frequently asked question and post them on the site for people to come view. This is a very different approach from fan forums because there is a little more freedom in fan forums and a wider range of people who might be able to answer questions. On FAQ sites, the questions are fairly general and very basic. With FAQ sites, the author of the sites is more invisible than fan forums because the users email questions to the general site (e.g. see below). Figure 1 (www.shure.com) - This is where users submit questions. The Usual Participants and Audience The main users of this genre, for both the manufacturer sites and fan forum sites are DJ or DJ enthusiasts who have lots of interest in it. They usually tend to be primary users. In most of the forums that I analyzed, the users were speaking from the standpoint of actually owning and using the musical equipment. Other parts of the audience may be people who are interested in purchasing the musical equipment, in attempt to find out which brands may be better than others. There is not a whole lot of interaction when it comes to the FAQ sites because they only take the generally asked questions and post them to the manufacturer site. Therefore people do not gain the flexibility and range of questioning that fan forums offer. There is lots of interaction with fan forums because it is up to the users to keep the forums running. Numerous different people will answer the questions that users ask in attempt to satisfy other users’ needs. So there is constant interaction with all of the users of forums. 9/13/2004 Confidential 2