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

Apologies, Z. You're quite right: I skim-read the thread too quickly.

[slinks off]

I understand the merits in that compromise Z, but I think it's based on a faulty premise - that Subs are automatically somehow more qualified to confirm the quality of an entry's English. I may not be a sub right now, but it's not hard to tell when something isn't clear or isn't in proper English. You need an intelligent person, not someone with a blue badge.

"Remind me what's broke and needs fixing? Tell me I'm sad and deluded, but I thought the aim was to attract more new readers, new writers and new content, and I don't see how tinkering with volunteer editing responsibilities can help in any significant way."

I know you've "slinked away", but I'm curious, do we really not see a different editorial processes as connected to content, readers and writers? The optimal set of processes and volunteers will help create more and better content - this will attract more and better writers, readers and volunteers.

It's clear to me that the processes we have are:
1) Incredibly outdated for the modern internet - they have barely adapted at all in years.
2) Inefficient, creating bottlenecks, especially with regards to editors
3) Not conducive to the production and recognition of quality content
4) A product of the BBC's needs and guidelines, which will no longer be necessary
5) Unattractive to most web authors, who have a variety of other publication opportunities

I've been thinking about this for years, so perhaps it's so intuitive to me that I have a hard time getting my point across to others. Or maybe I'm just wrong

Hi Jordan,

Yes, of course they're important, and this is the thread to discuss them. I was skimming a large backlog and lost the plot.

I've always been very concerned that nobody seems knows have any idea about how to attract new writing talent to this place, and I was having a mild panic attack along these lines at the time.

A couple of points:

>> I've always been very concerned that nobody seems knows have any idea about how to attract new writing talent to this place, and I was having a mild panic attack along these lines at the time.

I think recognition is the thing here. I'd like to see an annual "best of the Earth Edition" published as a book for the Christmas present "it's funny and you can read it in the loo" market.

I also think we could run competitions - I'd like to see a competition which we promoted to schools and maybe to universities. I had other ideas, but it's late. We could run internal competitions too.

Then of course it's self feeding: if there are a lot of university-style projects going on then the energy rises and people become enthused because of that.

In fact of course it's the writing-apprenticeship thing that makes us unique. How to tap into that and build on it?



I've lost track slightly myself. Am I understanding it that only Showcased entries would go on the FP? My feeling is that we should keep the FP busy and changing as often as we can, (however often that may be), but that the Showcased entries should not be alone there. Or have I misunderstood?

B

No, Showcase entries would perhaps be more prominent, or would stay on the FP longer, but Approved entries (and other things I'm sure) should also have a place on the FP.

By the way, I'm very tentative in what I say here. I'm very very aware I've not written anything here for over five years, though I have written quite a bit elsewhere.

Oh, and another thing that would encourage writers: stats. Let 'em know how many people have read their stuff.

And the option for them to be emailed with comments rather than having to come back to the site and check.

Am I correct in my understanding of your scheme, Jordan?

Normal unedited entries are written by researchers and can only be edited by them.

Approved entries become approved once they have been nominated by 2 curators and checked by somebody (can't remember who) for adherence to the Guidelines. They can be edited by any curator.

Showcase entries are nominated by voting, and can only be edited by an Editor.

The problem I see with this is that, as I've already stated, there are many authors who are not capable of writing an entry which is good enough to appear as "Approved" without being sub-edited by someone more practised at writing. If we move the normal entries to approved, and then get the curators to sub-edit them, they are in an unpresentable state but officially approved for as long as it takes to sub-edit, which in some cases could be a month or two. (1 month is the longest it ever took me to sub-edit an entry, but I'm a very competent sub-editor - there are many sub-editors what would have either taken longer or given it up as a bad job).

On the other hand we don't want to exclude these authors from the guide - I could name four writers who between them have written more than 100 very useful and extremely detailed entries, but every one of them required huge subediting work. Not one of those four could ever edit their entry themselves up to an acceptable standard even with detailed advice from others. The only way for them is a sub-editor and they know it.

Another researcher who has written a huge number of entries on his own produces good work but the English in it is still so convoluted that sub-editors have been close to tearing their hair out with frustration trying to unravel the convolutions of it.

I wouldn't want to exclude these authors, and even the authors who are capable of producing good entries still acknowledge that their entries read better after sub-editing.

So I think we need at least one extra step between unedited and approved - a picked state, when curators can edit the entry, but it is not yet considered ready to be a fully fledged approved entry.

So at the moment a sub-editors role can range from a quick check, which takes about 10 minutes, and is a rather unnecessary bottleneck to an extensive jiggle to make things more readable?

And as you say that there are some authors who aren't going to be able to produce English to the Sub Edited standard. I think all Scouts can remember the dilemma when an author has worked really hard, and produced something really special, but you know that it will need a lot of work to get it up to standard. If you're not a sub ed yourself you feel awful about dumping it on someone else.

But some of the entries that are produced by authors whose may not be polished are excellent.

Surely there's a step here which is "Nominated" where an entry hasn't been subbed yet?

My feeling is that we have two processes - one where the author gets a lot of advice and support, and one where they don't. As Gnomon says, some need help, and as Pin reminds us, others do not.

I think we should make it easy for the author to indicate whether they want editorial advice and support, otherwise some folks will be angered by what they see as unwarranted interference, and others will feel ignored.

One of the things that makes us unique is our ability to train writers. Let's really think about how to offer writers this apprenticeship.

Ben

The sub-editing is not the main bottle neck at the moment, because the sub-editors can between them process far more than the eds are prepared or capable of handling. But if the editor bottleneck were removed, the sub-editing bottleneck could become important.

Alternative question - do you think that the Sub eds could take on the Eds role without too many problems?

Gnomon, it seems that the crux of this disagreement between us is that an entry is considered "Approved" while a Curator is working on it, but before it's published... This seems like a triviality to me. If this is really the strongest critique you have, I'll happily defer on that small matter.

I think that PR, or whatever it ends up being called, *should* be a great way to train writers. In practice, I'm not sure how effective it is. I'm not sure there's any way to institutionalize something like that - it comes down to personal initiative and relationships, I think. Creative ideas like The Stretcher can certainly improve writers' output, but I can't think of anything else just now.

We can't institutionalise qualities like the sence of Wonderment that Pin and I were discussing, and we can't institutionalise the quality of support we give writers, or the energy and vibe of the site.

What we can do is create a place where those things can flourish.

What that requires is for us to institutionalise boundaries and processes which not only give freedom to confident writers but which also give support to aspiring ones. We need to institutionalise ways of recognising different qualities, not only the well researched factual entries but also the looser more creative pieces.

It's like gardening: we are digging over last year's beds, preparing the soil (adding judicious amounts of manure), putting ina greenhouse where the shed used to be, pruning the shrubs, mulching the perrenials, and planting delicate things by the wall that gets the most sun.

I believe what you guys are discussing here could do that, and I'm watching the discussion with bated breath.

Opening an older thread here, only just spotted this. I'm not a Sub, Scout or Curator any more, but I've been all three at various times, and nobody answered this:

"Alternative question - do you think that the Sub eds could take on the Eds role without too many problems?" If you are talking about picking entries nominated by Scouts, allocating to subs, doing the final check (which I don't believe is done any longer - at one point it was checked by TWO Editors) and publishing it I don't see why it can't be done without Editors.

In fact from what I've seen, it's the Editors who can't do without the volunteers because the Editorial Feedback page is full of simple mistakes that the 'professionals' missed (if the current Eds are even professional proof readers any more, or are they just people with the right job title that have been moved to the role) that the Curators have to fix.

I think the main thing the Eds look for on their final check is legal issues, but they do check the sense as well. They don't look for grammar and spelling mistakes as they have enough on their hands.

I suspect that some of these legal issues are likely to go away once we leave the BBC. The BBC have to be balanced and have a lot of editorial restrictions..

I posted something on my own blog the other day and I'm very well aware that I could be sued over it, but if that happens I'll just remove it, sorted..

http://www.refertomedics.co.uk/?p=208

I'm not sure how many threads there are talking about this, but I've only the time to skim this one. From what I've seen, my advice/opinion would be:

1. Keep the old names Scout/Sub/Curator. That way you get full carry-over of existing volunteers. The names give ownership of the three clear stages. If we need people with multiple responsibilities then we can give people multiple responsibilities without one umbrella term for all. If you truly want more people to have Curator rights, then give out more Curator rights.

2. Allow the volunteers to treat entries individually. If it's obvious that an entry is fully ready, let them chuck it through to the Approved Guide post haste. If it's unreadable, allow the subs to hold it back from Approved status until it's ready. We want to remove the bottleneck without sacrificing quality.

Alex