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

"What domestic success"

Sorry, it can be hard to tell if someone's being sarcastic from their writing.

I am a licence payer but I would like to know...

What does the BBC get out of it, then?

The words I right, and grant the BBC the right to publish - they would not have the right to publish those words if I did not come along and write them. We are researchers. We provide information that the BBC would otherwise be lacking. And you can go to the BBC's website and find links to h2g2 articles that it would not otherwise have.

We offer our thoughts, we offer our time, we offer our learning, we offer our experience and we offer our dedication.

I, too, would have preferred that there was an upfront warning, some time ago, that conversations about the war would not be permitted. I would prefer that the BBC tell us we could not discuss it on the BBC at all. To tell us that we can only discuss it where we can be strictly watched and moderated is to denigrate the sense of community that the BBC crows about on the DNA Hub. It claims to have scintillating communities, but we can't behave like a community and we can't discuss things the way a community would.

Nothing is ever provided gratis. What does the BBC get out of this project? Why did it take it over?

The BBC has the right to publish (not the copyright). This by now amounts to a tidy number of contributions, many of them researched very meticulously.
So the question has been raised before, is it just to treat the subscribers thus?
It is in any case legal.
We've been told this much here in this thread, along the lines that we have a privilege. Not a right. So this is where we get off.
The House Rules, while saying that they can be changed at any moment, don't quite take this tone. Maybe they should, it would have saved argument, as then everybody would have been in no doubt from the start just ...er... where they get off.
Take it (as this is a very well organised site, and otherwise thoroughly enjoyable) or leave it (if it somes down to a matter of principle).

I thought BBC Online was funded by BBC Worldwide, the commercial wing, rather than the UK's TV license fee.

I posted this in another thread but think it is pertinent here also.

I have been here 2 years pandapig. I believe the current moderation of the 'Iraq' site was the direct result of a very limited number of researchers who injected comments on the deaths of politicians.
While I am sure such comments were made in the heat of the moment there in lies the problem. Now that we are certain of being at war within hours passions are running high. This leaves a posibility that talk of this nature could be concieved to incite. While we all believe in free speech we have to remember that this site is owned by the bbc and must conform to it's rules and regulations. They must err on the side of bbc regulations or they may not have a job. For the whole I believe the moderators have done a great job. Out of the thousands of posts I have had 2 questioned by moderators {and I did not liked it} but were put back in after a few hours. I think we must give the moderators the benifit of the doubt during this very unique and troubling time. Hopefully in the near future things will return to normal. {as for who and how the bbc policies are written,legalities,subscriber imput,not being a UK citizen I have no knowledge or say}

I do want to make clears my thoughts on moderation. The above post is a statement of support for the moderators who work at bbc. Not it's moderation policy as a hole. {Though I have seen sites with no moderation at all be overtaken by extremist,hooligans and idiots} In my two years here I have used the yikes button for only 1 researcher who fits the above discription in brackets. I feel there is a very fine line between moderation and censership.

Well there you go Abi, that copyright rumour scotched. thank you

That has not been my experience, Starbirth. Your defense is self-serving because it supports what you would post or consider proper mostly. Not that I advocate inflammatory or threatening statements, but I do not fear them either. Why do you?

This is rather typical of elitest doctrines throughout the world right now. While the elitests are entitled to their opinions, those opinions should not go unchallenged, yet this is precisely what happens when the elitests make the rules of debate.

It's rather curious that there is apparently so much to fear from free expression. I think it reflects more on the moderators or censors than on their victims. If they were truly doing what is right and fair, they would have nothing to fear.

So what do they fear. Maybe each other?

Just curious:
Is it OK to print the whole thread for safe keeping, not for distribution?
And If so,any volunteers?

This post has been removed.

Thank you again, Analiese, for thoughts I would have liked to have expressed in the way you did! And: My opinion is, since yesterday, BBC has already crossed the border to censorship by far.

I'm not so sure if I really like to stay here as an ACE at the moment...

?. I really enjoyed that. So much I saved it so I can read it again in ten minutes after it's hidden.

Read it as well anhaga... and this kind of censorship starts to get so silly...

I'm glad I saw #5990 before it went POOF!

I've just had about seven or eight e-mails in my inbox - all from the mod team telling me I've been contravening the house rules in some way or another. I read the offending posts, and haven't attacked anyone personally - the one post that featured anything mildly contraversial included a link to a reputable source, as requested in the new house rules.
My initial reaction was f**k it then, if this is what the site's come to, I'm walking. But then I thought for a little longer, and decided to stay and become a pain in the rear.
I don't believe this rash of censorship has anything to do with keeping the conversation in one place so that the moderation team can keep an eye on the situation without being stretched too far. On the contrary, having had a look around several threads today the modding has been widespread - they didn't look stretched at all. It looked, in all honesty, as though they didn't have enough to do...
Could it be that the BBC are cynically exploiting their busiest and most vociferous community in an effort to boost membership and hit-rates on their Great Debate site? That by blanket modding any mention of the impending w*r and insisting that this will continue unless we meekly capitulate and join up with another community in order to discuss a matter of global importance, they are somehow making life easier for themselves.
I don't go for it. It's a ploy to either shut us up or boost numbers for a sister site.
If this gets modded I will post it again. Give us some proper answers please, treat us like adults. As someone has pointed out, H2G2 gets all of it's content generated for nothing. We have fun here, but don't treat us like clowns.

And so the conspiracy theories begin...



If the moderators haven't had enough to do, how do you explain the fact that so many of my postings are still hidden? Another conspiracy?

H.

I would like to echo Frogbits comments, we deserve better than this. It's also good to know that I haven't been the only one who has been the target of puzzling moderation decisions.

Ste

You're certainly not the only one, Ste...

H.

here here...

well said,could'nt agree more..

in response to 5988:
So because you have not experienced what I have my defense is self serving. You gain experiance through living so maybe you have not experienced everything in your less then 2 decades on this planet. Did you bother to read what I said: Since this is a bbc site it is prone to bbc rules. That is not the fault of the moderators who are doing thier job. The only thing I believe moderation is good for is to keep hooligan's and idiots from over running a site. For instance go to a unmoderated yahoo discussion room say for science. If there are 20 people in the room maybe 3 people will be trying to discuss science the rest are busy making sexual insults about each other.
But then again you know how us elitist can be.