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

I know it's going to be a while, but how will we know when the amazing Guide Mark II gets to the next stage of development? Are we talking months or years here?

Alex

We're basically talking decades, maybe centuries. Seriously, we hope it'll be up an running in a few months. It's a complicated project and the people working on it are working on lots of other stuff as well. We'll definitely keep you posted.

Much appreciated

No worries mate, we're very happy to keep you informed. Incidentally, just putting tomorrow's front page together - congratulations on an excellent project.

Thanks

I hope you've spotted all the deliberate errors

So, has the redesign got any closer, or are we still talking centuries?

It is getting closer. But it's very hard for us to communicate to you guys the sheer complexity of getting funding for this sort of thing, especially in the current climate of the BBC looking to get rid of up to half it's web content and 25 per cent of its staff. Right now we're undergoing business analysis by an independent company who will make recommendations to the BBC. This is also partly to do with what platform the site should sit on (either part of it or all of it). There's a bit of politics around this and whatever we do there always seems to be a very complicated process for us to follow. However, right now, we feel confident that we're going to get this refresh done. We'll keep you informed and we'll let you know when we can tell you anything a bit more specific, like timings etc.

Thanks Eds - you have my complete support and confidence

Until next week, that is

Seriously, if there's anything the h2g2 community or volunteers can do to help, let us know.

Icy

Thank you Icy - very much appreciated. Truthfully, the h2g2 community and the volunteers have been utterly amazing simply by being so patient. It's been quite frustrating for us, to say the least, because we know what a brilliant site we have here with h2g2 - we know we owe it to Douglas Adams to keep the site going and to push it forward - but that internally, it's always been enormously difficult to make the site part of the bigger plans for the rest of the business. The MOT we had last year did us a lot of favours. And once again, the h2g2 Community played a very important role in this by posting well-thought out cogent arguments for keeping the site on Seetha Kumar's blog. This did not go unnoticed by our own PTB. Any more developments, as and when, we promise to keep you informed.

Thanks Eds!

a question about the cuts

how much traffic does H2G2 see compared to the other sites???
+
how much resourses do we take up, people, eds, mods, tekys and the like compared to the other sites???

Taff, sorry to be such a bore but we are not allowed to discuss stats live on site with users. However, I can say, generally speaking, they're pretty good

"we feel confident that we're going to get this refresh done"

, good to know it's still on track.

<>

understand that onehave the same sort of thing at work, i can neither confirm or deny

when are we likely to find out if we are being axed???

I don't think they'll warn us - it would only incite mass panic.

They'll just pull out the plug when we least expecl“q E¨ ¾õ™Ñ€Þ[ò [ô»5m3
âÚÛ¿ÍæEÝ„¬™Ñ¢-žºU¹w Á ù©§VŒ°L=ñ^ÑÖ~ ]ÕõȈ'""'”Ëõ9ؼùÇ6 e
úí¾R²-y!»U™8GÙF § ¿Úã µà„èb@·“=
ww[à½p""£~V«|rZõM " "á¾þ-×ôxÃ2Ø3“Ù÷#›§7'÷Ê‚Ùe³M1S‰là öÊTUƒA•m9Vá –{ ò០ñûœ^›¨ ¤©yá?oel?óÙÉÌÎ-ÿbH§ö ve!–îuá㧕élàÓÎ qlTàYGúm! wv/IäªT´¤±üÆ z j¡YÑÖgåÒs ßã?Ž[—M>Ëøùø•#VALUE!¤ÕæCA ¤ó0 2fƒ u{ρ6 ó•)Ðmd4“û1´ ‚#¬ÜŒ_ý(=\HWÑŽ
Ý yGgA ¬•""üïO
ÈpL•Ï.g ay­Êï© å › XƒÛ¹èJÑôk§}?hË0y‡’]"× vÃ0#VALUE!#¤–‘×M †©I®2)ÿ¼§kߪ("´D£Aë³tø¤þºi+‰J""%AÊòUµ ~ fzº
h®@¢  à¦IÐöÕÔØ͸¤£h¶ «¶OTd2ÝÓKòuE åÃ7”^rT¾‰‹ Ü bIJ 0^ä;ïÉ
ø ҬͪdÔY4~""XZéŠÇ€O'¨tÓÏz ˜ïûøZè„i/Q¹ÖBúlÊŒœÄdÚ •¨]{<“f¢¿§ Fyhz¬Ÿa?©y25 ’®.°I
n;ò)x”-*¼g""+yckqºõ(U­Ë hC""–t šŠ
vHÖ‡fû )es¬š¿ lÅ O‡–ÞSe[œ)³#VALUE!KÊëèlœ{î½ ²ÍN°Q® é`Yº¢\ ½Ñêÿ ˆÓ '”Ë‚,Q âý ȐÌðê§Ï ó
Æ¡Š¡~½’H†¬V:z0MÓP{móI ¶" " E& `0QŸNv4­p –ù–$õQÿŠ )/ÔÙy­ Kùõ®”ëÝÔ•bH$'""Fw‚ ÉÖž ‚zׇ«pæ´“[¹¶1‘? ƈdå„þjØ(|îù¤4p4œŒßØ©•¬ õÕ" ">30ª@<¶wÃî7ë«HT'&f–2Òë¬L2Eí½‚®'Æ

We're going to make an announcement later on today ...

Is this an announcement about an announcement?

RF

Yes!

A fully-fledged announcement of an announcement beats all that cheap, tawdry foreshadowing of announcements one sees so much of these days.