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

Sorry for the delay in commenting...

I wonder whether (said Otto, using his favourite PR phrase) it would be worth us Scouts making a decision about the etiquette of picking entries that other Scouts have been working on, as I think this entry leaves it a bit unclear. On the one hand, I know how frustrating it can be to be gazumped to an entry that you've *helped* make great. On the other, I'm sure we've all done some summary / thread reviving work on more threads than we need to pick, and then been told an entry's ready when the picks are all gone. Dunno. Personally, I'm not bothered who presses the button....

I think it's also worth saying a bit more (there's another favourite phrase) about picks being rejected. My view (and I hope I'm right in saying this) is that having a pick rejected by the Powers isn't necesarily a sign of failure, indeptitude, or inadequacy. My particular scouting technique is to start from the back in terms of dates submitted, and I know I'm not the only one who does this. Sometimes I've recommended entries that I'm not sure about, and I'll say why I'm not sure in the recommendation box. I think it's important to do this, because otherwise "borderline" entries can just sit in PR for months. Some entries just aren't practically improvable beyond adequeate, for a number of reasons.

Thirdly, I know it's not technically part of the job, and is unneccsary in many cases, but I also think we should support and encourage newbie commentators in PR as well - obviously without being patronising! Without wishing to blow my own trumpet (because I'm sure most of us have done this), I've left messages on one or two occasions for new contributers on their personal spaces - particularly when their comment has gone almost unnoticed or acknowledged.

And finally, I think it would be worth adding some cut and paste guide ml for use in conversations. I've noticed that the more technically proficient Scouts can post links (to the other review fora, to remove the entry from PR and so on) - I can't, but I'd love to know how!

Otto

My view is that picks aren't the prerequisite of any scout, even if s/he's helped the entry along (Bossel has often said that he holds this view). Yes, I've occasionally felt a little peeved, but then I think, 'Oh, well!'.

There's a great deal of satisfaction in helping a newbie get to the front page - and sometimes to Editor's Choice (I remember Brislib made EC with 'Swinging the Billycan!').

As Otto said, if there's a borderline entry, it helps to have it submitted to the Eds for a decision. If it's rejected, then it's often clear what needs to be done.

As for links, I like to make suggestions for decent links if I know of them. Other Scouts have done the same for me in the past and I've been very appreciative.

To make suggestions about other fora, Otto you need to know the heading and put < . / > and < / . > round it (without the additional spaces). Here's an example:

< . / > Writing-Alternative< / . > which when put together makes Writing-Alternative

I've just (recently) stated that on the news group my feelings about ownership of picks. I nuture a lot more entries than I pick.I hope that the authors who get entries up to standard three weeks before my picks, will get picked by another Scout, it would be a great shame if a scout was put off picking it just because I commented on it.

If I've helped get an entry up to standard then it's got picked then I've done my job.

Hmm. If someone says something like 'I'd recommend this right now' or something like that, or if someone has done a lot of work with the entry, I check the calendar on the scouts group. If the person who has helped with it has a pick date within the week, or soon I leave it for him/her. If not I don't feel the need to restain my pick

I suppose so, but I wonder if so many Scouts go with the no ownership should I include it or not? Where do you stand on the issue of someone who has put a lot of work it being a little to involved to pick things rationally.

I'm also going to add a section that this isn't the definative guide to "what you have to do to be a Scout," just advice that you might find useful.

Good.

I don't think a section on ownership is useful, since it's widely disagreed upon. Apparently

actually I think I'll reccomend, checking if it looks like someone is on the verge of picking this, in a fluffy way.

I'm worried this might start to look like a way of standardising everything that we do, which I don't want to do, as I'm worried that Scouts that are new would Scout exactly according to the page.

That's expressing your opinion though, that scouting without checking is bad. You could add that some people think it's rude though, without my objection.

Also, it would be worth adding a reference or link to-

A584246 A View From A Scout
A695649 The Scout Report for 2001

Is this better? I do hope so

Jodan, as you're one of the most technically profecial scouts that I've come across I wonder if you know how to have a link that enables people to remove from peer Review? Thanks for all your input on this entry

Good idea, I'll change it again - so don't take what is put in the present form about ownership as final. I'll add the links of course.

Is this better ?

I really don't know how to do that, and it takes a while to look up

I think Rho does. I've seen him do it a few times

Better I think.

Oh right, thanks anyway for your input!

I'll drop by Rho's space and ask him, what do you think on the issue of ownership here?

Nice work! I wonder if it might go better if the excellent 'Finding Entries to Recommend' section went in at the top, ahead of the nuts-and-bolts 'Picking the Entries'? There's the old primacy-recency effect to think of, and I reckon it'd be great to start off by encouraging new Scouts to get involved in PR rather than just diving into PR and picking stuff willy nilly.

I'm not daft enough to believe that mine is the only way of doing anything, but can I put forward the subscription option as a possible MO to suggest? The way of working I've become most comfortable with, and makes me feel I'm doing the best job, is to subscribe to the PR thread when I come across for an entry that I like, preferably by contributing to the thread, even if only to say that I like it - and when picking time comes around, I can go back through my conversations and I can usually gather three pretty easily.

Picking the Entries Step Two - about checking GuideML... might it be worth suggesting the 'test' function to run a basic check the GuideML? My two pet hates as a sub are lower-case tags, which take forever to replace, and entries that use rather than <\P>.

Picking the Entries Step Six - suggest pasting the original article URL as well as the PR thread? It saves a lot of time for me when I'm looking for the original to compare my subbed version with.

How Perfect Should an Entry be Before it's Recommendable? - my own feeling is that a basic rule-of-thumb should be that if something *can* be brought up to snuff in PR, it should be.

Somewhere along the line, what do you think about suggesting Scouts ask themselves the question "Would *I* be happy to have to Sub this in its present state?" before recommending something?

It's been better of late, but a few months back I was getting stuff to sub that was such a pain in the arse to do that I was considering chucking my badge in...

What if I can't make my picks? - perhaps we could say that the main thing is that three picks are made. I could be wrong, but I find the Italics don't mind picks being a couple of days late if there's a good reason, like being gazumped at the last minute - through no fault of my own, two out of my chosen three last time got picked by other people after I'd asked the 'are you happy with this' question, and it took me about a week to find another two.

Also, if a pick gets rejected, I think new Scouts could do with knowing that they still need to make three successful recommendations, so they need to get back out there and find another, pronto.

A mistake I made with my first batch was not keeping track of how many I'd recommended - I was expecting the 'Recommend Entry' box to vanish after I'd made my three, didn't keep count, and ended up making about six...

Also, what about bonus picks? I used to think that they only wanted them to be made within a day or two of sending out a message on the Yahoo group, and felt I'd missed the boat if I was late downloading my email and shouldn't make one. But one of the Italics (Sam or Anna, I think) has since said that when they request bonus picks, everyone should make one as soon as they can after hearing about it, and it doesn't matter if that's a few days late. After all, they've got the option to refuse a bonus pick if they feel it's too late, I suppose.

Is it worth adding a bit about the kind of things we should be encouraging researchers to do in PR? There's adding h2g2 links, for instance, which I think could be done a little more. I didn't realise it an author could or should put links in until after my first few entries had been accepted. People seem to be quite responsive in general when it does get suggested - it's particularly good for people looking to get a second or third entry into the EG, or newbies of a particularly high standard.

OK - how's about that to be going on with?

Oops - made that without reading posts 21 onwards, but hopefully most of it is still relevant...

Hi number Six, thanks for taking the time to post so much it's nice to feel wanted.

I agree with you on everything apart from one little thing - bad Guide ML, when I was first a sub it was a real pain, then I discovered that I could cut and paste the text from the entry it's self, (not the text plus code that you get when you click on edit entry) and I put it into Guide Post, the wonderful programme written by MaW, then it becomes a simple matter of putting a plain text entry into Guide ML. I wonder if you've tried this - it solves the entire "bad GML problem" for me.

One of the best ways of preventing the bad GML from occuring is not telling new authors, unless they're really keen and already familar with Xml to put an entry into GML, because they generally do it all in lower case.

What I'll mention on my next rewrite (in about 4 mintues) is that when dealing with a keen newbie or a second or third time author that's keen to make the changes then to suggest the good Guide ML, but if it's a newbie who's struggled to get it into Guide ML then critiscing could put them off contributing in the future.

Okay, one more thing.
Don't mistake positive comments on how the entry was written for comments on the facts. Mikey (very) recently brought up that a scout could see all positive comments on an obscure entry and pick it if there are small factual problems with the entry

It's good to wait until someone can vouch for its accuracy, ask for references or perhaps research the subject a bit in questionable areas

Also, just found the code for removing an entry, if it's of any use -

<./>SubmitReviewForum?action=removethread&rfid=1&h2g2id=xxxxxxx</.>

With numbers where the xxxxxx is of course

Thanks, I've actually got that in the new version, I've got a problem with the guide ML that I haven't got the time to sort out.

I'm completely bogged down with work at the moment, (put it this way, I spent 12 hours in university today, and I didn't have time to check my e mail until 6pm)

I'll be finished by next thursday and i'll do it then. I'm going to keep this a work in progress until we know the changes that are going to affect the Scouting system, so I can add that to the guide.

Jodan - thanks for post 38... invaluable!