The title of this chapter is slightly misleading; I think the author is addressing professional practices in desktop publishing, not the ethics of the documenter. Nevertheless, the chapter is short, well written, and direct.

This chapter is a response to the previous chapter of the book [1]. The author clarifies the five ethical implications of the document database methodology: reusability, quality, user friendliness, standardization, and job security. Distinguishing between computerization and automation, he contends that automation lessens the requirement for clerical labor but not for professional labor. According to the author, a professional writer is “someone who can synthesize ideas and then express them with clarity.” The intellectual skill of writing can never be automated.