head in clouds heart on sleeve foot in mouth

Yes I'm one of the SubEditors, which is pretty cool. Does it make me better than you? Of course not. I'm just another Field Researcher. Just like you. We're both integral parts of what makes h2g2.com so gosh darned neato.

I guess the primary difference between a field researcher and a SubEditor is, on top of writing guide entries just like you do, I also get to edit the guide entries other Field Researchers write. At least, the handful that are regularly sent to my virtual desk.

Granted, occasionally people are unhappy with what I did to one of their submissions, but for the most part people seem happy and I seem to be doing an okay job. I'm always trying to do better, but then I hope so are you.

If you happened to click here cuz you just noticed one of your submissions got accepted but it doesn't look the way it did when you finished it, and you clicked on the name of that guy to the right of your approved guide entry to see what kinda jackass would turn one of your paragraphs into an unordered list, consider yourself lucky. At least I accepted it.

On average, for every ten entries brought to my attention, four actually make it past me, and not every single one of those make it past Mark and Anna. So it can be a gruelling process.

Also don't think I'm immune to the virtual red ink pen. I don't get to edit my own submissions, so I've been rejected too, and I've been rewritten. A lot. It comes with the territory. My suggestion to you is: develop a thick skin.

So don't come cryin' to me, unless you happen to be a gorgeous and sweet smelling available female. Then by all means cry all you want. Need my other shoulder?

Do I get paid? No. Do I know Douglas Adams personally? Heh, keep dreamin'.

Do I enjoy what I do? You bet yer ass.

While I have your ear, I thought maybe I'd post here a couple suggestions on what you can do in the future to improve your chances of having one of your guide entries accepted as an officially approved part of the Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth edition.

And this isn't just to do you a favor per se, although if you take these words to heart you'll be doing yourself a favor. I'm also of the opinion that if you take these words to heart, it might help make my job easier, and maybe help the other SubEditors too.

But if the following doesn't help you, just remember that not only am I a SubEditor for h2g2.com, but I'm also a SubGenius. So, consider the source.

ways of improving your guide entries

• If you haven't clicked on the Don't Panic thing at the top of every h2g2 page in existence and read that FAQ yet, do so now. Go ahead. I'll wait. If you refuse to read it, then I can't help you. Yes. The whole thing. Read the whole thing. Not just a couple places but the whole thing. Then come back here.
• If, after reading the Don't Panic FAQ, you still haven't read Submitting entries to the Guide, go read it now. It predominantly says we don't take fiction (yet. I'm still working on that), we don't generally take entries about stuff that's already been done, and we don't want you to force the humor. However, Mark puts it more eloquently than I can, so go over there and read it. Yes the whole thing. I'll be here when you get back.
• See? Now that wasn't so hard, was it?
• Okay, now comes a tricky part. Ideally I'd like to just say this: Make yourself familiar withGuideML. Unfortunately that's not quite enough to say.
  

  • Ideally, to do this well, you need to be familiar with HTML. You can do that by reading the many HTML tutorials on the 'Net, like Webmonkey for example.
  • If you're not familiar with HTML, then don't try tagging at all. Or, only use the 'P' and '/P' tags. Go at your skill level. If you are not comfortable with hyper text markup language (HTML), keep it simple and let us do the hard work.
  • If you are familiar with HTML but you haven't read about GuideML, then in some cases it might have been better if you just wrote the text and let us do the hard part. If you like HTML, my guess is you'll love GuideML. I do. I wish the whole 'Net was using it. So make yourself familiar with it.

  
  
  What's most important are the words you use. How you format them is not as important as what you want to say. So if you are not comfortable with mark up languages, just be sure that "plain text" is the Type Option selected below where you type in your guide entry before you submit it. If you are familiar with HTML, double check your tags before submitting.
• Spell checking and grammar: I personally have had the misfortune of not accepting at least one entry predominantly because the spelling and grammar was atrocious. This has happened at least once. It's not difficult in today's technologically driven society to run your prose through a spellchecker before submitting it. It's not too much to ask. I've also accepted guide entries that were badly spelled, but that's because I personally believed the content to be worth the extra effort. Every misspelled word in your submission is an automatic mark against it. If you want your piece accepted, making sure that the words are spelled correctly as well as checking your grammar and sentence structure can only improve your chances. It's a little extra effort but I'm sure you'll be proud of the result.
• This is covered in Mark's Submitting entries to the Guide, but it's worth repeating. If there is already a guide entry about Black Cats and that's what you want to write about, it would be easier both for you and for us if you just went to the Black Cats entry, started a new forum at the bottom of that page, and posted what you would like to see in a future update of that guide entry. In very rare cases, we have duplicate entries about stuff, but that's cuz somebody goofed. We only want one entry for each topic. Also, writing an entry and calling it "Black Cats and other Stuffed Animals" or using some long and vague description for a subject usually just ticks me off. Try to keep the subject simple. Stick to one noun (person, place, thing, entity, idea, etc.) per guide entry. And again, make sure it's not already done.
• Linking is a very good idea. Unfortunately, at present a large majority of Guide Entries are 'dead ends.' That means after reading that particular guide entry, you have to search again to find something else, or just go straight to the forums. H2G2.com should be a dynamic document where similar subject matter is linked together, or sometimes subject matter that's not at all related could be linked. So and as you get towards the end of composing your guide entry, scan your prose and see if there are some target words which you could use. Maybe if you were writing about Gorillas, you also happened to mention other animals like Giraffes or Hyenas. Do a search by typing one of those words into the field at the top of any h2g2.com page. See if there's an approved or submitted guide entry already discussing that topic. Then link to that topic using the GuideML information we've already discussed. Tips on how to link should also be available at the very bottom of your useredit page, if your submission is in GuideML type format.

Oh. One more thing. If your guide entry is not accepted, that doesn't technically mean anything bad. Your submission is still online in h2g2.com. We don't like deleting anything. So people can still read your guide entry. It's just not "officially accepted" which means it may not come up near the top of the list if someone searches for that particular topic.

It's not the end of the world. Keep plugging. :-)