h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Thanks you all. It was fun. I hope more people read it--if only for the jokes. Did you guys do your homework and check out the odd websites?

Will do so right away - just wanted to applaud you for this first. I work as a teacher and will pass this on to my students. Naming the source, of course. Copyright issues a topic for another article maybe?
There's a great book on the `Hitler diaries` by Robert Harris called `Selling Hitler`.
Anyway, kudos to you!

I didn't know Robert Harris had written about Kujau. Thanks! I'm looking forward to reading that.

And thanks - we're glad if this helps students.

Copyright issues...now that is a good idea.

It's tricky. My experience is that people cheat without meaning to - because they are so swamped with information out there that it's difficult for some of them to tell the difference between own, original thoughts and things they have read somewhere.

It is easy to do. You read something, and then you want to pass the information on. There are only so many ways to say it...

But there's an increasing tendency among internet users to use Copy & Paste as a shortcut around digesting, enhancing, and spreading information. I think that's one thing students need to learn: that it isn't acceptable, even if they're doing it from a free source.

A Guide Entry on mine turned up on Facebook. With attribution, mind, but simply copied from h2g2.

That's exactly what I mean. Not such a long time ago, Copy and Paste wouldn't have seemed such an attractive alternative - if your prof knew his stuff, he, or one of his assistances, would find you out. And the average student was pretty scared of this idea.
Now, I think, there are two problems: There's a wealth of thoughts written down somewhere, and what's written down somewhere, you can quote. Since it's written down somewhere - on the net, in a book - there must be some truth in it. The other issue is that it seems to some that any thoughts they pick up, no matter where, are free for sale. It's almost like a complete free-for-all.

Yeah. And they keep spreading mistakes around - it's like medieval 'scribal error' all over again. Witness the Maya V Patel quote.

I remember finding some strange factoid somewhere, with a person's name in it. I had to pin down whether this factoid was true.

I finally determined that all references to this factoid had the same source - because they all spelled a name wrong in the same way. Completely unreliable, this factoid.

Comes of all those web thieves.

Hi there Dmitri and Elektra! Congrats on this entry. I did check out the silly sites, loved that tree octopus (I've actually thought up a rather similar tree-living octopus-like creature for a science fiction story my father was writing) and in fact am checking out a few more! There's a nice one on the drug 'Havidol' (the name says it all) which is clearly something that everyone needs. I also like the one about the dangers of bread (though of course bread *is* dangerous for some people like you know yourselves!) and the dangers of 'dihydrogen monoxide'.

Here's a link to some dubious sites:

http://www.philb.com/fakesites.htm

Thanks, Willem! That's a good site.

Great entry, Elektra and Dmitri. Next time I need o research something I'll look here first.

Dmitri - Maya V Patel? Who, or what, is this?

Maya V Patel appears to be an imaginary person. It is suspected that some prankster invented her as a source of edifying quotes...

Those quote sites never fact-check.

I just googled it - someone out there's got a sense of humor. I wonder how long it takes to spread a myth like this?

According to one Dublin student, who did it to Wikipedia, not long:

http://www.thefirstwonderoftheworld.com/2009/05/fake-wikipedia-quote-of-maurice-jarre.html

Funny! And the quote's so cheesy... But then I expect journalists must be under intense pressure.

Yes, indeed. One of many reasons to be wary of quickly-published sources.

Even true ones. I was pretty shocked by the images of Gaddafi's corpse displayed almost everywhere in the major news channels. It seems like someone started this, and everyone followed suit. Not good, I think.

Were the pictures real? I haven't kept up, and I avoid videos.

I haven't looked at the videos that are supposed to be on youtube either (I just don't want to see this sort of thing), but the photos taken from them were enough to see in print. You see a bloodied head with a gun-shot wound and I think that's terrible enough. I feel a line was crossed here.