Welcome!

Are you seeking a skilled writer, perhaps with elementary web design skill?  Inversely, do you seek a web designer with a superior command of language?

Do you require expert health, nutrition, medical, technical, or other writing? Must materials prepared for you possess a logical structure and flow, all necessary detail, and accuracy in fact, figure, and explanation? Alternatively, do you require expert writing in consumer issues, the social sciences, or related subjects?

For all these skill areas, you have found what you seek. I am Vincent C. De Benedetto, a published writer of significant skill; I am seeking a full-time writing or elementary web design position in the North Jersey area, or via a telecommute. My easy facility in language results in clear, intelligent, and well-written materials of any type. My substantial intellect, analytical turn-of-mind, and creative imagination will ensure the superiority and efficacy of content, not just form, in producing writing that accomplishes your goal(s). Additionally, I possess a good grasp of basic HTML, XHTML, and CSS, contributing to my status as a "talented amateur" in web design. In fact, I have created a number of functional and attractive web sites from scratch, using simple hand markup; the site at which you now reside is one of them.

Software tools I have used include Word, Outlook, RoboHelp, FrameMaker, Doc-to-Help, NoteTab Pro, OpenOffice Writer, FileMaker Pro, and PhotoShop. I can learn your tool of choice, without difficulty.

Professional organizations of interest include:  Society for Technical Communication (STC), Association for Information and Image Management (AIIM), IEEE Professional Communication Society, and ACM SIGDOC. While at Seton Hall I was President of its ACM chapter.

Writing in Health and Nutrition

I've maintained a strong interest in these two vital areas for many years, including environmental health, though until recently I've applied my knowledge directly to the improvement of the health of my family, and did little writing. Recently that has changed, however. My flagship writing project in this area is my compelling and increasingly comprehensive internet resource KEYS TO GOOD HEALTH, incorporating a substantial cross-section of my knowledge in health and nutrition. The site, having just celebrated its one year anniversary, incorporates the most unique and powerful health analysis available.

I've also composed an approximately thirty-page booklet entitled Lawn Care & the Health of Your Family, produced for community distribution, that seeks to educate and persuade away from lawn care using toxic pesticides, and deafening and polluting lawn equipment, in favor of organic materials and methods, and "old-fashioned" quiet and nonpolluting lawn care and gardening tools and implements. The latter category includes the classic push reel mower, rake, and broom. As a community Health Educator (non-credentialed), I am proud (and relieved) to report that I persuaded two families on my block to terminate their TruGreen/ChemLawn lawn treatments. Both families permanently discontinued use some time ago.

The scope of my health knowledge can also be gauged by subscriptions to digital publications I've enjoyed:

• ConsumerLab.com's e-Mail Newsletter (ConsumerLab.com assesses potency, purity, and other relevant parameters of a wide variety of health, wellness, and nutrition products).

• American Lung Association's eNewsletter "Fighting For Air Online" (ALA is at LungUSA.org, and is the "...leading organization working to save lives by improving lung health and preventing lung disease through Education, Advocacy and Research").

• American Lung Association's eNewsletter "The Promise of Research."

• Johns Hopkins Medicine's "JOHNS HOPKINS HEALTH ALERTS" (This free public service helps keep you up to date on the latest breakthroughs for the most common medical conditions which prevent healthy aging).

• Total Recall Info's "Daily Worldwide 'Recall Alert' newsletter" (TotalRecallInfo.com, "The World's 1st Recall Information Source," monitoring worldwide recall alerts for defective products of every kind, including those pertinent to health and wellness, then collating and redirecting this information to subscribers).

Moreover, I maintain a membership in Noise Free America. I'm the charter member of the North Jersey Chapter.

Caregiver Experience

My resume shows a period without paid employment; this is the time during which I was full-time caregiver for my father, suffering a serious cognitive decline, diagnosed as Alzheimer's disease. In fact, as such a caregiver I learned more in difficult and concrete terms about this devastating and insidious malady than could ever be transmitted from a textbook. This kind of tough personal experience, in concert with a full understanding of current dementia research, makes for helpful, compelling, and unforgettable health writing.

Writing in Technology

I am not just an ordinary technical writer, but one vitally interested in personal computing in larger terms, given its seminal social and technical character. Thus, on numerous occasions over the years I have voluntarily provided insight and feedback, often in the form of "Features & Usability" reports submitted to leading technology companies and their principles. These powerful reports have been found credible and taken seriously, resulting in personal responses from computing luminaries like Steven P. Jobs of Apple Computer.

The same powers of analysis and composition that caught the attention of these world-class technologists can produce powerful and effective documentation for your product or service. Written material that is structured, clear, complete, and accurate makes your product or service and its operation transparent and comprehensible, thus reducing or eliminating resource-intensive telephone inquiries and support calls!

Additionally, I have created a unique optional process called DSM Integration that can help your company (1.) create more usable, powerful products, faster, (2.) provide more informational and efficient technical support to customers, and (3.) provide marketing hooks to assist in selling your product. I accomplish this during the product documentation process through the efficient, incidental creation of brief reports or bulletins pertinent to the Development, Support, and Marketing (hence, D.S.M.) of the product. These reports, respectively, are entitled Internal Development Notes, Internal Support Notes, and Internal Marketing Notes. They are transmitted to the Development, Support, and Marketing groups, giving the first department feedback and suggestions for refinements and enhancements to operation and interface, providing support personnel with a database of facts and information (such as installation nuances, undocumented features, etc.) available for use during support, and presenting the marketing department with key features, benefits, characteristics, or other relevant information to assist in marketing and selling the product. This multi-node procedure makes explicit, exploits, and strengthens the relationship and link between the product, and its development, support, and marketing processes, a critical and leveraging relationship that is often ill-formed in organizations.

Writing in the Social Sciences

I have achieved similar results in social science, politics, and consumer matters. For example, in March 2003 I conceived and wrote a formal, 6-page, non-partisan proposal, projected as the basis for a new U.N. resolution to avoid war with Iraq. I submitted the document, principally by fax, to 19 foreign embassies with ambassadors or representatives on the United Nations Security Council, including Germany and France, the two nations most vociferous in opposition to the imminent conflict. In this country, I submitted the proposal to the offices of Colin Powell, Hillary Clinton, and others. Additionally, I submitted it to a wide variety of major print organs, from The Nation to The Wall Street Journal.

For these lone and intensive efforts, I was gratified to have received an oral commendation and "thank you" from Elbert Garcia, Congressional Fellow of New York Congressional Representative Charles B. Rangel. I also received a written acknowledgment and "thank you" from The Wall Street Journal for my submission.

Near the finale of this endeavor I published the proposal online at its own dedicated website.

Other writing projects under this rubric include that for a web-based effort, the International Society to Preserve the Beauty of Space, to temper the impending gargantuan intrusion of commercial images of every variety into our natural space environment. For example, about five years ago Tricon Global Restaurants Inc., parent company of Pizza Hut, Inc., was seriously and actively planning to project the Pizza Hut corporate logo onto the surface of the moon. This is but one of many such planned activities, by every manner of commercial interest.

Of my effort, Leonard David, Senior Space Writer for Space.com, remarked:

Additionally, the project was cited in a published article by a well-known writer, appearing in a well-known business publication.

Web Design

Besides my writing skill, I offer web design skill. I have thus far designed fifteen interesting, attractive, and highly functional websites; each was hand-coded by me in HTML, XHTML, and CSS. Amongst these was a fully-functioning e-commerce site whose payment, billing and invoicing, and other electronic commerce functions I researched and implemented, and that ranked extremely well in searches using popular engines such as Google and Yahoo. These top rankings were no accident, but occurred because of my search engine optimization (SEO) engineering, a body of knowledge I would be pleased to press into service for you to the benefit of your site(s).

Additionally, if your site requires or could benefit from a discussion board, I have experience implementing and managing the famous open-source phpBB board. Moreover, another site of mine featured a functioning PayPal Join button that I implemented, and I've implemented chat rooms across several sites, as well.

Graphics

I've worked with graphics extensively, principally in resizing, cropping, and adjusting such other image parameters as brightness, contrast, saturation, hue, and sharpness. I've also done image overlay.

Just about any image you see on any of my sites was modified by me in one or more of the aforementioned ways. I webmastered and ran an appliance sales website, and engaged in extensive image editing and enhancement to create visual product appeal:  I produced product images that were large, crisp, and bright.

In sum, then, you will find my skillset especially appealing if you require straightforward, attractive, and functional website design from someone with a working knowledge of HTML, XHTML, and CSS. And if your web design projects could also benefit from exemplary writing skill as a co-, or subsidiary, requirement, I am your ideal candidate.

I use NoteTab Pro for hand-coding, and various tools for image and graphic manipulation.

Interface and Database Design

Moreover, I also have expertise and creative flair in basic interface and database design. I have worked, thus far, in Filemaker Pro, designing professional interfaces for Simon & Schuster in the publishing industry, and creating a wide variety of elementary databases for my own personal and household use.

Proofreading Ability

While not possessing a formal proofreading credential, there is no question that I am extremely and organically observant in matters of language. With no effort, I continually notice typos and other language mistakes. In fact, I've begun compiling a rogue's gallery of some of the mistakes I've found in various print and online publications, as well as spoken gaffes in television and radio broadcast committed by professional journalists and broadcasters--presumed experts in language who should know better.

Broadcast-Quality Vocal Ability

A recent prospective employer unsolicitedly asserted that I have a "broadcast-quality voice." Indeed, friends and family have remarked for years that my vocal ability and general manner of speaking suggested a career in radio. Previous positions I have held that called for, and made use of, my speaking ability include teacher of English as a Second Language (ESL), and substitute teacher. Additionally, I have studied voice.

I have a detailed, glowing letter of recommendation from the Executive Director of the Uceda Language Institute, the educational institution at which I taught ESL. This document is available for viewing.

Accordingly, if an available position requires, or could otherwise make good use of, strong skill in speaking, reading, reciting, or narrating, especially as applied to serious subject matter, whether technology-related such as narration for a disk-based, online, or live software demo, or for a journalistic or related project, I would be an especially attractive candidate. If such a position had a combined job requirement of voice and writing, or voice and basic web design, my appeal would further rise in proportion.

Examine My Work

Here are links to samples of my work, in various categories. Please click your area(s) of interest.

For employers seeking a writer:  please note that, unless otherwise indicated, I not only HTML hand-coded the creation of every web site accessible from my "Web Design" page, below--I also composed every word for every site.

Resume', References, Remuneration, and Employment Overview

My principal employment for a decade has been as web designer and webmaster our family appliance business, DeBenedetto Vacuum (see sample portions of that web site, now defunct). Interspersed throughout this period, however, were a number of short-term outside work assignments I was offered and purposefully accepted (please request my resume), while continuing my principal employment. Many, though not all, of these positions were technology-related. In recent years, business principals in our family organization have advanced further into sunset years and become increasingly unable to fill traditional company duties, making continued web operations difficult. Accordingly, I am now available for, enthusiastic about, and actively seeking, a full-time permanent position with an outside company. I seek a position as writer or technical writer, doing basic web design, or simply working in language, technology, or their intersection.

Webmastering was a language-intensive position. In my assortment of additional short-term outside positions, some were writing-related and some not. Throughout my life, however, whether working professionally in language or not, a common thread has been my writing--I have continued to do it, throughout. This is why I can easily populate an entire web site with writing excerpts and samples of every kind.

I have decided, then, to seek a position that capitalizes on my second greatest strength--writing. In fact, my principal strength is thinking, that activity and its product expressed and manifest by the creation, manipulation, and recording of printed symbols--the act and process we call writing.

The employer who hires me will be the beneficiary of this mastery of language, analytical skill, and force of intellect. Indeed, the quality of my work has garnered me several letters of recommendation and reference.

Remuneration

Though a highly skilled writer, I'm re-entering the job market and am not focused principally on money but on re-establishing my professional credentials, as well as finding a company and position with longevity. Thus, I am flexible on wage and salary.

Please contact me by electronic communication. I look forward to hearing from you--let's get started immediately on your next project!

My Best,

Vincent C. De Benedetto