Welcome back (Oct 15, 2011)
I arrived on h2g2 in late 2002, shortly after the BBC took over h2g2. At that time, people spoke of the interval with wistfulness... romance, even. I can now say that I've survived a somewhat similar event, though in this case there's much more for the community to feel wistful about. It's been the better part of a year since the BBC decided to dump h2g2, and I couldn't be prouder of this community. The small role I played in the transition convinced me that this will be a successful endeavor.

Speaking of that small role... I had initially expected to serve as one of the interim Guide Editors. However, as the transition took longer than expected, I was forced to give up that hope. With several important deadlines looming, and with my girlfriend (who had been abroad with a temporary job this past summer) due to return, it seemed like I wouldn't have much time for h2g2 after August. Icy North replaced me on the team - an excellent choice - and I'm really excited to witness these Guide Editors in action. They'll be great.

However, in past few months, I've finished some major projects and my the girlfriend and I have amicably parted (still great friends, luckily). So I'll be around, hopefully I've already started writing my first entry for the new h2g2. Hopefully it will be the first of many.
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(6 replies, Latest reply: Oct 19, 2011)

Showcase (Jul 11, 2011)
The Showcase is an idea whose time has come. A86099809

I'm excited about the panel we've convened to select entries. It includes some of h2g2's most prolific and most talented writers. We also managed to convince Robbie Stamp to help out.

So please mosey over there and nominate the very best entries on h2g2. You only have 3 votes (1 EG, 1 UG, one neither) so be careful and thoughtful. By nominating an entry, you're saying, "This is the best entry on h2g2 in this category."
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(10 replies, Latest reply: Jul 12, 2011)

Not with a whimper (Jun 21, 2011)
Even though I missed the pre-BBC h2g2 by a couple of years, I still have a strong sense that with this morning's announcement, we are going home.

I'm really proud to have witnessed this process, and to have been involved in some small way. I'll save it for wiser heads to impart the story of the bid (if that's possible), but I suppose I can say that I was not as heavily involved in the bid process as several other froods, whose hard work has quite literally saved h2g2 - not just as a website, but as an idea.

However, I am excited to get to work on building the Guide, by writing, reading and editing. I've spoken with Robbie Stamp, and I'm quite convinced that he will make an excellent Chairman. He has been thinking about how to make h2g2 and the Guide a success since before I had even read the books. As you might have seen (A85803384), I've volunteered to work as an editor for the Guide until elections are possible (which I don't believe I will be able to stand for).

I've seen several false dawns in my years here, when I believed that things were finally changing for the better. This is the first time that I don't just believe, but know, that we have an opportunity to make the Guide what we always knew it could be. F21537567?thread=8244219
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(20 replies, Latest reply: Jun 21, 2011)

An Apology, an Appreciation (Jan 30, 2011)
I just saved my EG entries in a Word file, just in case. Having been a few years, I was happy to see some entries I had forgotten about entirely, and unhappy to see a few (early) entries that never should have been put in the guide in the first place.

I was astonished, upon finishing, to look at the page count. 827 pages in Word. For that, I can but apologize now. Even with something in the region of 140 entries that I consider to be my work, 827 pages is bordering on ridiculous. So, to you, the h2g2 community, I apologize for my long-windedness, and to the BBC, I appreciate your hosting all of that. I've loved writing for the Edited Guide on the BBC, and I hope to write for the new h2g2, wherever it may land.
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(24 replies, Latest reply: Feb 8, 2011)

Kinks in a hose (Aug 17, 2009)
It seems that my writing for h2g2 comes in spits and starts that are almost unpredictable. I really don't know why.

In April, I wrote my first EG entry in about ten months, and since then I've written eight.. eight of my favorites, incidentally. It's been a fun few months, but I can feel that this particular urge has inexplicably run its course. I've been reading a riveting book about the Mississippi flood of 1927, but I haven't been taking notes (not even mental ones) or thinking of entry ideas. In June, if I didn't set aside an hour for writing every night, I started to get restless like a werewolf at the full moon. Really. It was inconvenient and exciting.

Animals have a biological imperative to procreate, I've heard, but it eventually ends after they've made their own contribution to tomorrow's food chain. I guess, for now, I stop at eight.



I found a website yesterday that offered free audio books for download (probably one of those websites that half the internet had heard of - the other half knowing of a superior alternative), and I snapped up Wodehouse's "Three Men and a Maid". So I spent the better part of tonight laying outside in a hammock with a pint of ice cream, listening to the first few chapters. Great stuff. Even better when narrated by a British accent. I don't know that there's better accompaniment to ice cream on a hammock in twilight than Wodehouse.



The results of the MOT is supposed to be announced tomorrow.
Sometimes when I'm about to go to sleep, I think about how things are different at that moment from when I woke up that morning. As much as every day seems to blend together, there's almost always that little something about my world that is irrevocably different. A new friendship, a broken appliance or a tiny victory. In 24 hours, I wonder what my miniature account for the day will read. I'm anxious.
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(6 replies, Latest reply: Aug 18, 2009)

Neighbors (Aug 14, 2008)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7559881.stm

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5...AyZ1wt-fM_YS6UnSulmL4-DBeAD92H2DM81


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(5 replies, Latest reply: Aug 14, 2008)

Perseid Shower (Aug 12, 2008)
I don't really follow astronomy. So I only found out that there was going to be a meteor shower last night at about 1:30 AM, when I was getting ready to go to bed. I'd never seen a meteor shower before. I had never really seen a shooting star... just the kind where you see something out of the corner of your eye, and then you turn your head and it's gone, but you convince yourself it was a shooting star. I had never really been looking, though.

So, even though I was tired, I decided to see what all the fuss is about. After about an hour, I put on some warm clothes and grabbed a blanket and headed out.

I hopped the fence to the local golf course which is about a mile west of where I live, and I laid down on one of the hills facing east nearby one of the greens.

What I saw of the meteor shower was pretty neat. I think I was too early to see the real height of it, and there was still a lot of light pollution flooding in. But I saw a fair number of them. About 3:30, I was pretty tired. I decided to head back because I was afraid I'd fall asleep and get nudged awake by a putter attached to some local cardiologist. (Donnie Darko did it, and look what happened to him)

A good way to spend an hour, anyways. Much better than sleeping
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(8 replies, Latest reply: Aug 13, 2009)

Bringing New People onto H2G2 (Jul 9, 2008)
I've been tossing this around my head for a while, but I'm not quite sure what to do with it, so a Journal seems like the most obvious place to let it out.

I've been thinking that there needs to be a fresh initiative with the sole aim of bringing in new people to h2g2. It seems to me that when we talk about advertising the site, we're talking about T-shirts and side links from BBC articles. I think it makes more sense to put the process of recruiting more people into the site into the hands of all of the site's users.

What I'm envisioning is people crawling across the web to drop links where interested people might be. Obviously, there's a very specific group of people who are strange enough to want to participate in the h2g2 project, so we would want to focus on that. I mean, a facebook group about Douglas Adams, or some kind of intellectual blog or whatever - dropping a link there could bring a few more curious people in. But there's more than those general interest . There are tons of political blogs out there where I could post links to my political entries in the comments. There are dog websites and blogs where we could post or submit links to Mina's fantastic dog entries. Cooking websites where we could link an unusual recipe found in the Guide. There are all kinds of topics which are in the Guide which would be interesting to outside observers - and some of those people might stick around.

I remember a thread in askh2g2, I think, where people were asked how they found h2g2. Most seemed to have the same answers - Salmon of Doubt, sheer coincidence, a friend mentioned it, etc. Those are fine, but I'd like to see in a few years a similar thread, but with entirely different answers and many more responses.

So this is just an idea which I decided to post about late on a Tuesday night (or early on a Wednesday morning). Is it worth pursuing further? Would other people have the enthusiasm to take the time to post relevant links around the rest of the internet?
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(53 replies, Latest reply: Jul 25, 2008)

That's Dedication (Jun 13, 2008)
Tonight I was researching for an entry I'm somewhat excited about, and I came upon a quick mention of a remarkable man named Philip Lampi, who has apparently singlehandedly catalogued the popular vote results of the earliest (1787-1825) elections town-by-town *by hand* based on old newspapers and local election reports.

So, I googled his name and read a bit more about him. This article came up - http://www.neh.gov/news/humanities/2008-01/TheOrphanScholar.html It says he lived in his car from 1973 to 1988 - 15 years! - working on this, driving through the eastern states in America to work on this project. It's really amazing. I simply can't begin to imagine how much effort this must have taken, the tedium, complexities and costs. But now, having access to his figures online (I didn't know such a thing existed until tonight) is an exciting thing for an American history such as myself.

What's really amazing is that one person could give up his life *his entire life* to something so obscure and meaningless to 99% of his countrymen. I guess it goes to show, if you have a passion, or if you think something is important, then run with it and don't let anyone tell you to stop. And Lampi might die a lonely man, having spent his life in libraries rather than in raising a family, but at least he'll have accomplished something. The article quotes him as saying, "It hadn't been done for two hundred years. There's a good chance it might never have been done"
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(10 replies, Latest reply: Jun 12, 2009)

Vote for the Edited Entry of the Month (Apr 11, 2008)
Go here, A34311746 read the entries and vote For February, please take a look at this entry in addition to the others - A30081700 (you're allowed to vote for entries that aren't on the shortlist). I think the EG Entry of the Week is a great, positive way to boost quality in the Edited Guide.

Looking at those entries, though, it's funny how other people's tastes are different from yours. My top two favorite entries I've ever written for h2g2 were published in January, 2008. However, the one entry I've had short-listed for EotM? It's the *third* entry of mine that was that month. Personally, for January's I like How to Survive Jumping out of a Plane, but I haven't read them all yet.

Anyways, go vote
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(2 replies, Latest reply: Apr 12, 2008)

Field Researcher (Apr 5, 2008)
I recently received an iPod Touch as a gift (far more than I deserved) and I highly recommend it to anyone who has the means to get one. It's really . For instance, the past three nights, I've gone on long late night walks throughout my town with music playing. When I've come upon something interesting, I've whipped out the old iPod, touched the 'Notes' section and written it down. I've also discovered a Rare and Used books store right not far from my neighborhood which I'd never heard of before

Almost all of my entries in the past have been based on books, interviews, documentaries and internet sources. Writing down notes on landmarks, streets, architecture and things about my town (ultimately for an entry, I hope) has made me feel like a real researcher in the mold of the original field researcher, Ford Prefect. It's a cool feeling.
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(13 replies, Latest reply: Apr 19, 2008)

5,000 Dollars/Hour is Far too Much to Pay for a Prostitute. (Mar 12, 2008)
In case you haven't heard about it, the story is still on the BBC News international front page - http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7290071.stm

I don't really care about whether the governor of NY State hired a prostitute, but honestly, 5,000 dollars per hour? I suppose it is intended to guarantee a high quality and a certain level of privacy (though that doesn't seem to have worked out for Mr. Spitzer). I saw it remarked somewhere that the only time I'd pay anyone 5,000 dollars an hour would be for life-saving surgery.

Of course, this same sort of thing happened to a Louisiana Republican Senator a few months ago, so it's been interesting to watch conservatives (who insisted that it was a family matter for the Senator back then) condemn the Governor. Once again, a Lewinsky-type "scandal" like this doesn't bother me at all. If he had used public money, that would be wrong (especially when he could have easily saved taxpayers money if he got a prostitute in Times Square - or wherever the NYC prostitutes hang out these days).

On another note, happy birthday to Douglas Adams. I recently reread the first of the Hitchhiker's Books, and I was again impressed by how intelligent and funny the man was. I had almost forgotten Wish you were here, Mr Adams
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(4 replies, Latest reply: Mar 15, 2008)

Velocity (Feb 26, 2008)
I went to an Obama rally here in Ohio today, along with 11,000 of my closest friends . I managed to grab some pretty good seats - fourth row, pretty close to the platform. It was a great experience. The woman who introduced Senator Obama was a local who quoted too deeply from the Declaration of Independence... she quoted from the second paragraph, which is what everyone does (We hold these truths to be self-evident) but then kept going, into the section about overthrow and abolition of the government, which I thought was an odd choice.

Senator Obama is an extremely persuasive and inspiring speaker. I've watched his great speeches live as they happened... 'This was the moment...' from Iowa, 'Yes we can' from South Carolina, 'What began as a whisper in Iowa...' after Super Tuesday and of course his incredible 2004 Boston speech. But it's tough to compare that with the energy and inspiration that comes from listening to him in person. It's impossible not to feel something, I think.

Maybe it's my infatuation with history and its great men, maybe it's my inherent optimism and idealism, but I tend to believe that rhetoric and a force for inspiration can change the world. There's something valuable in the power of persuasion and inspiration. That's not nothing. If I can paraphrase a line from The West Wing, (spoken by the character Sam Seaborn) the measure of a great speech is the velocity with which people rise to their feet to applaud at the end. Once people are on their feet, who knows what can happen?
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(23 replies, Latest reply: Mar 6, 2008)

Today I Turn Five (Jan 26, 2008)
Has it only been five years? The personal space U201497 was created January 26, 2003, though I had been wandering around h2g2 since September, 2002 in various accounts. Nevertheless, this is my Hootoo-versary today and now I am five. According to this website - http://www.nncc.org/Child.Dev/ages.stages.5y.html if U201497 was a human child, I would now be able to skip, know basic colors and use swear words to get attention.

It's been a long five years. Lots of accomplishments, changes, friends and conversations have come and gone during that time. I was largely absent from hootoo for about a 1-1.5 year period of course, but I hardly think that should keep me from enjoying some birthday
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(28 replies, Latest reply: Jan 30, 2008)

Favorite Entries (Jan 18, 2008)
I was looking at my personal space tonight, and I realized that for all the stuff I've written for h2g2, there are only a few pieces that I feel an actual connection with. They're entries whose subjects moved or entertained me, even if the entry itself does not have the same effect. Some entries challenged me, some educated me.

My most recent EG entry is The Ashtabula Horror A29443223 which was nothing less than haunting to research. Digging into lives and stories of these people who died so suddenly and so brutally was brutal, and made me rethink how I view stories of disaster and death. It was also my first time trying to write something historical in a narrative format, so it was challenging to me.

A5104333 Alexander Hamilton is my hero, A1118648 Ty Cobb is the most compelling character I've ever written about, A8379507 Turd Blossoms and the American Dream is one of the weirdest angles I've ever taken on an entry, A30334808 the Potomac is one of my more elegantly thought out entries and A1043173 Andy Kaufman is an entry that wrote itself, but I should have stayed out of the way and let Kaufman tell his own story more. A4814110 Filibusters is the first entry I really set forward my opinion in. A3773225 The Assassination of JFK had me paranoid for weeks. A2622142 Preparing to be Inaugurated is the first entry I really took an unusual angle on. A3556820 European Cities in Ohio is the most pedantic topic of an entry I've ever written. In some way, all of these topics and entries left an impact on me.

I am writing this not because I think you'll be interested in my few entries, but because I wonder if anyone else has entries that they feel connected with? What entries are you most proud of (EG or not, obviously, I'm just talking about EG entries because that's all I write)? Has a project or piece you've written ever changed you in some way? For me, writing (for h2g2) is all about learning and discovering. Is it that way for anyone else?
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(26 replies, Latest reply: Jan 21, 2008)

American Regional Dialects - a Request (Dec 30, 2007)
Could any of my American friends tell me about the accents/dialects in their region of the country or their impressions about dialects from other parts of the country? I would also be pleased if one of my friends from another English speaking country could tell me his or her impressions of the American accent, compared to your own local/national dialect.

The reason I ask is that I'm working on a project on American Regional Dialects for the edited guide A30481706 (but I wouldn't read them just yet, they're not finished). I was planning it as one entry, but it's turned out to be an absolutely massive subject, and has ballooned to seven entries (and I'm on the verge of making it eight). I'd like to have some impressions, opinions, stories, experiences or even facts to throw into the entry. You'd of course be entitled to a co-author credit, if I use something you say (and if you want such a credit).

PS - Can anyone tell me how I go about submitting a University project these days? I have a feeling that the old Uni page is out of date.
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(243 replies, Latest reply: Dec 14, 2008)

The Open Guide (Nov 19, 2007)
I've been known to believe some silly things. I believed in the UnderGuide, which has succeeded spectacularly where so many other inventions failed. I've believed in h2g2, even when I've been away from it, and the strength of its community since I joined this site about five years ago. And now, I believe in our Edited Guide, and I believe that there is nothing to stop h2g2 from defeating the creeping malaise and the proliferation of flat, unstimulating entries.

This journal is not an effort to convince people in my vision, which has been fairly well belabored and unsubscribed from elsewhere. It is a call to action. If you have an inkling that the direction of the Edited Guide is wrong, if you've ever felt excluded by a certain set of standards in the Edited Guide, if you've ever been too intimidated to confront the less logical aspects of Peer Review and its process, if you feel that h2g2 has to be its own site, then I am calling for you to take arms and make a difference.

Make a journal entry explaining your frustrations. Write an entry that you feel typifies what the Guide should be accepting, and submit it to Peer Review. Post in the EGWW and Peer Review, and challenge the hell out of the assumptions that form the status quo. Start a conversation with a friend or in an open forum about the future of the Edited Guide. Write something for . Read A4053412 PROD, which was the beginning of a discussion about the Edited Guide's future about a year and a half ago. Ask yourself if you want someone linking to these conversations a year and a half in the future, with nothing having changed. Be vigorous, polite and reasoned.

As a name for a vision, I think that 'Open Guide' neatly sums up what I feel needs to change, and I have some specific ideas that I will argue for. However, because of the very nature of this 'open' movement attitude, we will have different ideas, and I look forward to embracing and debating your own visions and beliefs. The unfortunate tendency of a 'closed' guide is that some of the most thoughtful and open-minded people tend to be shoved aside, and are used to being wallflowers and observers of the EG. It is these people who are needed most. It is time to come forward. While I do not believe the strength of our numbers will change things, I do believe that the strength of ideas will.

-Jordan
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(23 replies, Latest reply: Nov 29, 2007)

The Soul of the Guide (Nov 8, 2007)
I've been thinking about h2g2 more in the past two or three weeks than I have in the past two years. I have paid little attention to h2g2 in the recent past, little enough to not realize how bad of shape it was in. Now I'm glad that there's a real effort to bring the EG back to its feet. But I haven't really participated in those discussions, which as many of you know, is odd for me. I have not written a journal asking my friends to get writing or changed my nickname with encouraging words. Those are fine things to do, but I feel like I have more to say than that the EG needs *more* entries.

h2g2 is, by any standard, a very mature community. It's been around for upwards of 8 years, which is nothing short of an eternity in internet-land. I think that it is finally time for hootooers to stand on our feet and make some bold decisions about our site. We need to say that this guide is ours for the making, and we want to be a part of something special. We need nothing other than a will to live up to our purpose, and we will succeed. I implore all of my friends to not only spend some time writing an entry for the guide, but write an entry that you feel defines what the guide means to you. Spend time in Peer Review, but bring with yourself an openness to the unconventional and a resolution of focusing on the important parts of the entry. Volunteer as a Subbie or Scout, but focus not on bringing an entry up to the standards of a 'typical' hootoo entry... rather help the author realize whatever vision he or she brought to the topic. Encourage new writers, and help them learn what makes this place so special.

I reject the notion that fighting for quality, and for the soul of the guide, is in any way exclusive or elitist. I reject the notion that focusing on quality will reduce the total number of entries produced. h2g2 is a rich soil. Weeds will choke the soil until the ground languishes, and nothing new will grow. But plant a diverse group of flowers and plants, and we will see new growth we've never imagined before. My vision is for an h2g2 that allows the beautiful and the flat, weedy entries to coexist... but hopefully, someday there will be enough beautiful, unconventional entries competing for the sunlight that the weeds ones will learn to bloom.

-Jordan
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(100 replies, Latest reply: Jan 24, 2008)

Marking a Moment (Sep 23, 2007)
When the movement that became the UnderGuide was first beginning, there were people like Deidzoeb, Ben, Spiff, Waz, Tube, Terran, sprout, GTB, FwT (and looking at that list, I'm saddened by how many I haven't spoken to in probably two or three years), and others debating the concept of creative writing on h2g2. I was engaged a bit in those discussions. I don't know how I wandered into them, but I read and participated. They were scattered across many fora, and it was kind of a hassle to keep up with all of them, and find the new ones when they popped up.

I distinctly remember, in one of those discussions, seeing someone say that, of course, the AWW would never be as busy as Peer Review, but we could at least stop it from being such a dead-end. Well, looking at the review forum pages, <./>RF5</.> seems busier than <./>RF1</.>... this week at least. That's probably due more to the sudden weakness of PR than anything, but I just wanted to commemorate the moment when I discovered that the AWW is now usefully fulfilling its purpose in the great web of h2g2. It's a destination, not a dumpster. The UnderGuide's name was created by a misunderstanding. Deidzoeb (I think) had coined the term 'Underguide' for the places that entries went to die (it was more than the AWW, I think it included the FM, WW, CWW and the Grim Reaper) and he mentioned it in a thread at an opportune moment, and someone mistakenly took it as the name of the project that was being discussed.

Maybe PR, with its restrictiveness and focus on the mundane (spelling, formatting and grammatical errors) could learn something from the AWW, with its openness and focus on the important. And incidentally, being someone who's got his hands in both the UG and EG, I'm kind of troubled and happy at the same time It's an odd sensation.

(in a gadfly-kind-of-mood)
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(3 replies, Latest reply: Sep 24, 2007)

Questions for Hootoo... (Aug 16, 2007)
Okay, so I have a few questions about Hootoo. I have no desire to create one of those "State of Hootoo" journals that occasionally pop up, bemoaning the lack of enthusiasm and chumminess of old (and anyways, I think we idealize the olden days in our heads, or at least I did when I used to bemoan). I'm just curious about a few things.

1. How's the UnderGuide? Who're the editors these days? I notice I'm still on the UG Editor's pages, leading me to believe that it has not been edited in a while, which is a shame, because it's "Editors" who run it.

2. Am I still Vice President? I ask because if so, I need to remember to steer clear of sordid scandals that could rock Alabaster House.

3. What happened to all of the Italics? I think there were at least two or three when I dropped off the face of hootoo.

4. Anyone know how to stretch out a T-Shirt? My old blue hootoo one is too small, and I'm having to wear it as an undershirt when I wear it, which isn't often because I don't need a blue undershirt that often.

5. If I wrote two solo EG entries under aliases, can I get that damned 100 entry badge without having to write a whole new one? Being stuck at 99 was something I originally thought would be fun, but I just feel like I have to beat all these whippersnappers I've observed who're sneaking up on me


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(45 replies, Latest reply: Sep 5, 2007)

The Jade Sheep Commands you... (Mar 19, 2006)
Thursday (March 16) was my RL birthday... a very nice one incidentally, I have some very nice things to keep me busy now. However, my favorite gift of all could come from you, the h2g2 researchers.
The <./>UnderGuide</.> is beginning a recruitment drive - we need fresh blood to keep the UG running at a full pace. I've issued these sorts of requests before, but if you would like to join in, know someone who might, have hesitated before, have the badge but aren't really active, have tried to join before, etc, now's a pretty good time to do it. You don't have to be a brilliant literature critic to volunteer for the UG - I'm one of its longest serving volunteers and I can barely find my way through most novels. However, the UG has been immensely rewarding for me, and taking a part in it was one of my best choices (if not the best one) on h2g2. Plus you get a neat purple badge.

*ahem* Now that that personal testimonial is done, go ahead and signal your delight at this fabulous opportunity. Go on. You are transfixed by the power of the Jade Sheep


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(42 replies, Latest reply: Jun 5, 2006)

The Time Has Come... (Jan 15, 2006)
...for a break Every winter, I usually get a little bored with hootoo and contemplate leaving. That usually doesn't last for too long, but this time it's coupled with an increasingly busy RL. So I'm going to try taking a break for a week or two.

I'll still be answering email - on UG business (not that I do much of that normally - if someone wants to be a UG Ed you can see my email address on my space ) or the normal saving-the-world-from-the-forces-of-destruction issues. I haven't been posting more than twice a day at most for a while now, so I doubt you'll miss me. Like the Sheep Schwarzenegger once said...

"I'll be baaaaa-aaaack."


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(39 replies, Latest reply: Jan 23, 2006)

As approaches the birthday of the baby Jesus... (Dec 24, 2005)
...so does mine My h2g2 birthday is in about a month. 3 years, it will have been. I always forget my birthday (well, I have the previous two times... I think) so I'm loading two birthdays into one journal - kind of how you'd celebrate two family members whose birthdays are a few days apart at the same time so you don't have to make two cakes.

I'm not as artistically talented as Waz, or as poetic as some of my other friends here, but all I can say is that my faith was restored tonight - not because of a Christmas miracle or a good deed, but because a minor flame war erupted tonight over the future of the site. I took it as a relief to know that emotions were still held so firmly over this home, this great nexus of opinion, this h2g2 of ours. What with all the doom-sayers, I felt my confidence erode for a while, but even today I see a whole army of researchers and friends, content to spend their time in the one thing many of us share.

I should hope I won't be here tomorrow and the next day though Merry Festivus (ooh whoops, I guess it's the day after Festivus, but... pah) to all, and to all a good night.


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(18 replies, Latest reply: Jan 6, 2006)

The Drive for RF5 (Nov 22, 2005)
"Well hullo viewers, and welcome to the 18-hour telethon for the Alternative Writing Workshop <./>RF5</.>. The phones are ringing off the hook right now so I'll keep it brief. I'm your host, Chuck Barbell, and you can see the number at the bottom of your screens there - yup, just dial R-F-5 after the skin and simply pledge your time to a few entries and leave a few comments in the AWW thread. You'll receive a nice tote bag or a tape of Sheep opera for your pledge."

"If you enjoy quality programming like A3892575 "The Springtime of my Death" and A1158662 "Why I Hate Sheep", please pledge your support now. It is only with public support that the UG can continue to bring you these things. We simply can't stress how important your support is. But to illustrate it, let's bring out the big board!"

Two highly paid models wheel out a board showing a goal of a chicken in every pot and a couple of reviewers in every AWW thread as well as a progress line that's well short of the goal.

"As you can see, we need every bit of support we can get to read our goal. It's been proven that the more active the AWW is, the more submissions it gets. Please, give... 'til it hurts fer all I care..."
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(22 replies, Latest reply: Nov 23, 2005)

Won't you pour me one more of that sinful Old Janx Spirit... (Nov 6, 2005)
While h2g2 is tearing itself a new one and losing some old ones, I thought I'd try something productive...

Based on a very quick and absolutely inaccurate count, I'd say around 70 people have me on their friends list. Surely some of you are willing to spend some time as a miner for the h2g2 UnderGuide? Quite simply, it's the most enriching thing I've ever done on the internet and some of my best friendships here were made in the mines of the UG.

One of the wonderful things about the UG is that its volunteers come and go as they wish. You get a badge, and you keep it forever (unless you want it taken away, I guess... that's not happened ). As a miner you can help pick entries whenever you feel like it, or forgo a round if you don't feel like it. As a polisher you can polish an entry one month and take a four month break if you like. It's all very flexible.
(and, having been on more than a half dozen offsite hootoo forums, I can say that when the UG's is busy, it's easily the most entertaining of them)

You don't have to be an AWW regular to join, or really ever go into the AWW. Some of our best miners were complete newbies with regard to the creative side of hootoo. You don't even have to be that smart - just look at me!

Anyone, anyone within earshot right now of my journals is encouraged to join the miners (A1092494 and A1092539) and/or the polishers (A1092548 and A1092575). If of my current or former UG compatriots are within earshot, maybe they could give some testimonials of this too oft-concealed and buried side of h2g2 Or else.

- UG Ed in charge of Volunteers.
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(32 replies, Latest reply: Nov 12, 2005)


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