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

Not only as a newcomer, you should _not do_ the following:
- Shout (using capital letters LIKE THIS)
- Curse
- use 'adult' vocabulary
- use slang expressions (not everybody will understand you),
- pick on minorities (they could well be a majority here)

In writing your first entry:
- again, read the guidelines. There are still too many first-time authors who have to be told to avoid first person and all these points.
- look up some edited entries and compare them with their pre-edited versions (which you find from people's home-spaces)
- do your homework: search the Guide for similar entries before starting

And _do_ the following:
- read the f**ing manuals (oh, see what I mean?). The 'don't panic' button brings you there
- go read people's home-entries, otherwise you may run into difficulties if things get personal
- stick to the topic of a conversation
- make your point clear, ie: avoid misunderstandings. See the entry on smileys
- remember that your postings will be saved until eternity
- be aware that the Guide community consists of people from _all_ over the world (yes, including Antarctica), and they all can see your postings, and
- some people may associate _you_ with your origin
- therefore: think of yourself as an ambassador of your country. You take over responsibility for more than your own person..

Don't use intrusive points of style to make your postings "stand out" - for example, while it may initially seem like a good idea to put two dozen carriage returns at the end of every posting you make in order to "space them out" from any which follow, once you have posted two or three times to a thread in this manner all you will have achieved is ruining the "flow" of the thread for everyone else. Ditto, signatures of more than two lines get really tedious when they are repeated down a thread.

Do try to be specific about the locality which your comments refer to; "UK Channel 4 ruined 'Angel'" could make a lot more sense than "Channel 4 ruined 'Angel'" to someone living in the central USA where "Channel 4" may be a small local news station.

Don't send spam emails or make spam postings to newgroups or discussion forums.

For more information on spam and what it is, please see the H2G2 Guide Entry at http://www.h2g2.com/A184088.

Oh, and another thing, DO become familiar with the different kinds of smilies and what they mean. Even if you don't use them in your emails and postings, chances are other people will. Knowing what they mean will help you understand other poeple's emails better, and make yourself better understood. Since text is so monotone and void of emotion (UNLESS YOU ARE SHOUTING), smilies help fill the void and give greater depth to what you're trting to say, if used properly.

42!

Phoenix

^..^

Don't direct everyone yo pages like this:

[url removed by moderator]

Remember, at the other end, people can't hear the voices in your head.

If your post is meant to be read in a sarcastic voice, use the tags, e.g.

Windows 95 never crashes!

Don't cause offence.
Don't take offence.

How about replacing your researcher number with a name of sorts as soon as possible. I always feel like a real fraud warmly welcoming someone to H2G2 when all they are is a number.

Aim for clarity and brevity with your postings. Remember that people don't really enjoy reading text on screen, and remember also that their days are generally full of other things, not least of which is a virtual stack of other email and forum postings to wade through.

Avoid self-indulgent in-jokes and rambling prose. Few people will take the trouble to read through more than a few lines of e-text, and if you fail to respect this your potentially useful insights may be consigned forever to the cyber-slushpile...

Think before you post. As mentioned above, any 'blurted-out' statements, whether typed whilst tired, drunk or otherwise distracted, will be here as evidence of your lack of forethought for a long time to come.

Plus, bear in mind that humour is not universal in its tastes. One person's best gag is another's crude and offensive comment. Or possibly at the least stupid and facetious. And if you do make what seems to you to be a side-splittingly funny remark, don't ram it down other people's throats if they appear not to have 'got it'. Chances are, they have, but it's just not funny to them.

I admit guilty to several of the crimes mentioned above. And more besides.

I write postings that are too long (although I try and space them out to make them less daunting). Who cares if you're in the "most erudite" for a few hours?

I continually send postings almost immediately after each other because I have forgotten something or notice a mistake just when pressing the "post message" button. (I bet I do it this time, too)

I nitpick and correct people's spellings (unless they are obviously just typos or I know the person has admitted to dyslexia or the like).

I have posted two mass e-mail thingies - is that spam? One was the Revocation of Independence a few days ago which was a great success in several forums, and the other one was on losing weight. They weren't advertising, though.

.....

I would appreciate it if people used more of an introduction in their postings on specific subjects. Often you get words like "here" or "we", or "on this side of the pond" and you don't know where "here" is, who "we" are or which side of the pond the writer comes from. Sometimes it is necessary for the understanding of a posting to know if it is a male or female writer. But I have been led to understand that you aren't supposed to assume a gender (even from an obvious nickname) until the person has publicised this themselves. Sad, but it has led to misunderstandings and profuse apologies more than once in threads I have been following.

......

If someone joins a long forum late in the day, I can't blame them and I don't despise them for not reading the backlog completely, if they are honest enough to say they haven't. This is quite acceptable, I think - what do others have to say?

I told you it would be a long posting!

I agree, it's a bit much to expect people to read through the whole of a thread's back catalogue, especially if it's a long one. Then again, it's a good idea to take a glance through to see if anyone's said anything on the topic you're about to post on. If nothing else, it adds credence to your posting if you can say 'As people have been arguing above', or suchlike...

Don't open a new conversation if your ideas fit into the topic of an already existing one.

Before you criticise someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. -- That way you are a mile from them and you have their shoes.

Don't just read the first page of a really long thread and then post based on what you've read so far - apart from really confusing things in the new thread structure, if you continue to read you might find that the person you're replying to has completely changed their viewpoint over time.

Oh, and if you reply in mid-thread with something generic like "I agree" you run the chance of appearing to be agreeing with whatever statement was at the end of the thread, no matter how stupid or offensive it happens to be. It's almost unheard of for anyone to actually check the "in reply to..." link to see what you are *actually* agreeing with.

*sulks*

Nothing wrong with being just a number...

If you get involved in a debate/argument, be careful when quoting bits and pieces said by other people in order to respond more clearly. Be especially careful not to take things out of context, but in addition to that, it's very easy to sound patronising without intending to.

If you're debating something which could get messy, always read over your post before posting it to make sure you don't sound either offensive or patronising... that way things stay nice.

And, of course, the golden rule... smileys are very rarely a bad thing and very often a good thing

26199

Actually I find smileys can suffer from over-use. They can also be a bit irritating if they're scattered too recklessly across a posting. If used without restraint smileys can defeat their very object, which is to overcome some of the limitations of virtual communication by providing a way of clarifying emotional responses.

(This is perhaps potentially a far greater problem now that the h2g2 powers-that-be have seen fit to unleash a whole 'clan' of these little creatures on us - more isn't always better, quite frankly...)

I would recommend to a newcomer that they try to resist the temptation to put more than one or two smileys, at the most, into an average length posting, and that they try to ensure that the ones they use actually have some bearing on the thoughts and emotions they are trying to communicate. Otherwise the darn things can obscure as much as enlighten...

Bossel, although I do agree with many of your do's and don't's, there's one I do particularly dissagree with and that relates to the use of slang or coloquial (sp?) expressions. The use of these, although may not be appropriate in some contexts, is an aspect of language that is able to express not only information but also, in many cases, the persons origins, background and a great degree of colour, which I for one appreciate. It also touches apon an issue of different language usage, not only in slang, but also formal language. This is after all forum for people from all over the world, as somewone already mentioned. So lets not put in place a set of rules that assume we all have the same bakground and all speak the same language.

And, eventually, the rest of the Universe, so long as they don't decide to wipe us out in order to open a new inter-stellar bypass...

Neugen seems to contradict him/her/itself by first saying that slang is OK because can convey more than a stiff, formal mode of expression would, then he/she/it goes on to say that we should speak a simple lingua franca (i.e. excluding local slang and regional expressions) because we are an international community.

Perhaps we should devise an H2G2's own slang? Perhaps we already have. Are there any expressions now in regular use here that would have no meaning anywhere else?

So long and thanks for all the fish.

Yup. Try talking about "the Italics" to anyone outside H2G2...