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

I just had an entry pulled by the M*der*t*rs, on the ground that it contained links that 'contravened the h2g2 house rules'. All three links pointed to .PDF files which deal with the acoustic capabilities of bats.

1. The contents of these linked documents *aren't* sexual, commercial, in foreign language or anything objectable.
2. Nowhere in the houserules does it say that links to .PDF files are unsuitable.
3. The links have been there since the entry was originally created and didn't raise any complaints from the Moderation team.
4. The author of the entry A792560 - Bayes' Theorem and Bayesian Statistics suffered from the same fate. I can't imagine that a document dealing with such a subject matter may contain unsuitable contents.


Hence I assume some new policy is being executed without prior notice.

please, what's the matter here?


Bossel

Well, if the moderator was using a PC and didn't have Acrobat Reader, the .pdf link would look like a broken link, right?

I also seem to remember something about there being disapproval of links that required specific software (i.e., something other than a generic browser) to view, but I can't remember who said that or where, so I may well be just imagining things.


Mikey

It's awfully hard to find educated staff these days, eh?

Well, as a matter of fact, Acrobat Reader is available for free and there are browser plugins and, if this was the problem, what's the difference to Flash animations?

Oh, BTW, nice to see you Mikey

With Flash, the page still loads if you don't have the plug-in, you just get a blank box where the animation would go. With Acrobat, the page just doesn't load if you don't have a reader. I don't think it's a matter of cost, I think it's more a matter of some people either not wanting to or not understanding how to download the extra software.

(NOTE: All Macs come with a generic image reader that will read jpegs, pdf files, and whatnot, and most new PCs are now coming with Acrobat Reader preloaded).


Mikey

Without a .PDF plugin, my machine would just prompt me where to download the file, rather than displaying nothing. Hmm, and what if the Flash thing was against the house rules?

Bit but would links to .DOC files be unsuitable if the Mods didn't have WinW*rd installed? Now *there* is money involved

Hi Bossel

BBCi users have an expectation that links provided by the BBC will be able to be opened without installation of non-standard software. We are not prepared to link to documents that require plug-ins to be installed or to those that require the installation of additional non standard programs, like Excel or PDF Reader.

We hope this explains why we cannot include a direct link to this document. If you want to give access to a PDF document, a solution would be to link to an external webpage that contains a link to the PDF file. You could then include some text explaining that this is a PDF file, which might necessitate downloading a plug in or the Acrobat Reader program. This link would be acceptable because it would link to an active web page rather than directly to the PDF file.

Hope that helps

Abi

Would it be acceptable to have a post something like this:

Warning: the following link is a PDF document and requires Adobe Acrobat (which you may already have) to view. If you do not have Adboe Acrobat, you can find it here: [link to Acrobat Download page]
[link to PDF document]

For example, http://www.bbc.co.uk/northernireland/education/pdftips.shtml follows this policy, so it can't be true that you *CANNOT* allow a direct link. Perhaps your Irish cousins know something you don't?

-Martin

http://www.bbc.co.uk/northernireland/education/summer2001/potato/potatopdf.shtml

Meanwhile this BBC page has, shock horror, direct links to a PDF file. What is the world coming to?

Hi

This suggestion is actually a valid one, however, the concern is that, in allowing links to web pages that require a download to view them, we would be excluding those Researchers who access h2g2 through non-PC/Mac platforms.

As for the other BBC links pointed out by Lucinda, although we all come under BBCi, there are many branches of it that have different rules and criteria. So while we cannot discuss the policies of other branches, this is our policy - h2g2 has always tried to make itself as open to as many people as possible (one of the benefits of the Edited Guide, is that if you look at an Edited entry it should be able to be seen by people on all platforms). We have already seen a significant rise in the amount of people who access h2g2 through a platform other then a computer, for example web TV and games consoles. For example, I understand that though PlayStation's official hard-disk drive and web browser is yet to be launched, there are unlicensed browsers on the market. This is just one of the many alternatives to tradition PC/Mac web access.

Additionally, many web TV browsers currently do not allow downloads, which means that for those Researchers the link will appear as broken and broken links are removed during moderation. We are not trying to inconvenience people who wish to link to PDF files; as I have already said it is just a by-product of trying to be as accessible as possible.

Silly rule IMO.
This makes links to certain files less easily accessible for say 90% of h2g2 users. And the .pdf files can't be accessed by the Web-TV etc users even though people post links to bypass the BBC/h2g2 restrictions (see Abi's first suggestion). That doesn't help them one bit...

PWS: Will links to sites which run Java/Shockwave Flash/quicktime etc. also be removed?

I have to be honest here and say that I don't know, Tube, and that the best I can do is try and find out what the DNA policy on these files is.

I am not sure I will have the answer for you today, as the DNA team members who deal with this are off training people.

Abi

Re Posting 10: "h2g2 has always tried to make itself as open to as many people as possible (one of the benefits of the Edited Guide, is that if you look at an Edited entry it should be able to be seen by people on all platforms"

Links to .PDF files are only meant as an *offer* for further in-depth sources. They are not required to access the contents of an entry, otherwise the entry itself would need some expansion. Hence no-one is excluded if a link is presented to something that requires whatever additional thing.

Taken ad absurdum, your point of view would mean that there never should be an entry about a Ferrari because that would exclude me, as I'm afraid I won't ever be able to afford one

Thanks Abi!

Who are they training, the Mods?

Bossel, valid point about the in-depth stuff.

That's cool Abi - it'll be interesting to get the official word.
Of course, this wouldn't have happened if the policy change was announced *before* being implemented. Or even if the House Rules had been updated. Ho hum.
-Martin

Hi

Just thought I would post to let you know I haven't forgotten about this.

Abi

Hello

The House Rules were amended after the successful trial of URLs in postings to state that URLs included in postings must be 'suitable'. You can find the original announcement at F77636?thread=164383 and the confirmation of the success of the trial at F77636?thread=173132

At present, with regard to links to sites requiring plugins or additional software installation, we apply the 'suitable' criterion in a discretionary manner. As I said in my previous post, we are aiming to be accessible to as many users as possible, regardless of platform or technical ability, and it is for this reason the PDF links were failed. Many sites that use Flash have an alternative non-Flash version for people without the plugin, and PDFs often have a pure HTML version that people can access, so links to these kinds of sites would be fine. It is BBC policy to link to things like RealMedia files and Flash files only from within a friendly HTML context, such as a link to enable the RealPlayer to be downloaded, and h2g2 cannot break BBC policy, even in user-generated content.

Abi

> "It is BBC policy to link to things like RealMedia files and Flash files only from within a friendly HTML context, such as a link to enable the RealPlayer to be downloaded, and h2g2 cannot break BBC policy, even in user-generated content."

So, if I create a friendly HTML context on h2g2, perhaps in a seperate entry, then I can link to RealMedia, PDF, or Flash files? I think that's a good policy, actually - genuinely increases accessibility without placing over-onerous burdens on the rest of us, or stopping us from providing useful information to each other.

Good show
-Martin

Intresting that limitations should be put on a media type that is described by Adobe® as "the open de facto standard for electronic document distribution worldwide"