Jonathan, I have spent the last few years going over writing-for-the-web skills with our staff. For the basics, I’ve used an “old” classic book, Hot Text. There’s a lot on the web now, too, and I send relevant stuff to my staff to help keep them thinking about how to write better for the web. I have to say, my staff has gotten more and more savvy about it on their own. When you see the difference in open rates in emails written a certain way, it helps the learning process a ton.

One thing that concerns me is two dimensions beyond mere web publication are style and useability. There are web reading style givens (e.g. skmming/scanning, time dimensions) and many useability issues (serifs, contrast). New authors venturing into webland tend to bring their print baggage. What happens is, writing and graphical styles almost never transfer well from print.

This creates another type of vetting: re-purposing content and web translation. As techies we can demystify and empower all day. At the same time we empower clients with technology we need to be empowering them with web realities like writing style and useability guidelines.