Gurus' Home Page | Why be a Guru? | What do the Gurus do? | Gurus' Code of Conduct | Volunteer to be a Guru

Here's a quick introduction to the h2g2 Gurus scheme. It summarises the advantages of being a Guru, what h2g2 gets out of you being a Guru, and also covers the Gurus' mailing list.

Benefits of Being an h2g2 Guru

We do hope that you get as much out of volunteering on h2g2 as all our other volunteers. Remember that you should be doing the work because you want to: we do hope you'll enjoy being a Guru, but we will never question you if you decide that it isn't really for you. Just let us know if you change your mind, need to take a break, or would prefer to join one of our other volunteer schemes instead.

There are plenty of benefits of being a Guru. Here are the main ones:

• You get direct access to the in-house team, who will answer all your questions for you as quickly as possible - including those which aren't for general consumption. In other words, you get to know things that other Researchers don't... as long as we can trust you to keep them secret!

• You get access to the Gurus' mailing list (see below).

• We'll let you know about new gadgets we're developing for the site and encourage you to have a go and comment. This is a real opportunity to influence what happens on h2g2.

• You get a shiny Guru badge on your Personal Space and have the right to add <./>Guru</.> (which appears as Guru) after your name when posting.

• You get a considerable amount of kudos within the h2g2 Community.

How You Can Help as an h2g2 Guru

For more details, see What do the Gurus do?

We need the Gurus to help inform the Community, so we can give the best customer service possible without sounding plastic and unenthusiastic (after all, the best people to help those who are stuck are those who love the site in the first place). The site couldn't exist in its current form without them: the Gurus are absolutely key to keeping the Community informed of and involved in developments. Researchers have plenty of questions; it's only polite of us to give them answers.

We also get to discuss our development ideas with our volunteers before they become reality. Often we've changed an idea because, after debate with the volunteers, we've realised that things would be better if done differently.

The Gurus' Mailing List

The Gurus and internal staff currently communicate private material via a private mailing list, to which all Gurus are subscribed. When we subscribe you to the mailing list you receive an email detailing the URL and the various ways of accessing the mailing list.

The mailing list is for invited members only, so you can be perfectly candid here. Indeed, that's the point: this is where we'll tell you the real story as well as the 'official' version, and for announcements about new versions of the test site and suggested changes to the scheme. At the same time, please keep general Guru conversations off the mailing list so as to avoid filling it up with lots of friendly greeting messages - please do that on the Gurus' Home Page here on h2g2.

That said, any questions you have can be fired at the mailing list, and you'll find the other Gurus will be happy to help you out. We like to let discussions develop before diving in with any official standpoint, as you are very much involved in the development of the site and the scheme, and discussion aids that. It's also a lot of fun.

This page replaces the original at A540172.