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

Hi Ben,

After a rather shoddy evening (the heating has broken, just when we thought everything was OK for the house move ) I've decided to break my new no-h2g2-at-work rule in an attempt to feel better. I hope what I write here is useful to you. As you are no doubt aware I have no idea about the of business analysing, so this is a layman speaking.

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Political
We may not be able to attract any grant money unless we can show a tangiable benefit to a group of people (unlikely) but we *can* use the Big Society to try and create some publicity when we feel we are ready.

Apolitical - good

We all know about those religious discussions, and I do worry that debates like that detract from the site. If nothing else, people re-hash the same debates over and over again, just with new victims. I don't think there's a way of fixing it though.


Economic

Although ideally I would like the joint bid to work in the way that you describe I would be wary of putting it like that in such black and white terms. It almost sounds like you are insisting that we run the place the way we want to and they are only allowed to pick up the tab and fund new development. If nothing else, we want to be involved in development just as much as a new owner would want to be involved about Editorial decisions and direction. It just needs the lines to be smudged a little, I think.

Social

Inaccessible from work - ho yus. On the plus side h2g2c2 is not blacklisted from my computer at the moment.
My access is blocked by category. If we could get ourselves somehow catalogued as something like learning or information somehow (Wikipedia isn't blocked either) we might be able to get around this. I have no idea who decides on this categorisation thingy though. At the moment I can't even get them to approve a website about construction qualifications.

Falling student numbers - good point. I wonder if we should also include those who are retired or not working for some other reason? I wouldn't know how to reach out to those groups though.
Students are good as they tend to be learing how to write and appreciate the guidance here.

Volunteering and personal enrichment - YES. A crucial aspect is that there need to be more. At the moment, there are only three active ACEs, one of which is on holiday and the other I haven't seen for a week. It's just me, and I'm supposed to be cutting down on my h2g2 time! Part of the problems is a) lack of new people coming through and b) the technological problems we are facing with the newbie list. Once we move away from BBCiD it will solve 90% of our problems as we will be able to cope with the reduced workload and be more rewarding as we know that if someone signs up, they actually want to be a part of h2g2. Sorry, I got a little carried away there.

A caring community - I like your text. I'm not sure all would agree about the quote. h2g2 has to be balanced - if one gets too important the other shrinks, and that diminishes our overall effectiveness.


Technological

Google
First paragraph - yes, although given how low we have appeared over the years I don't think this will actually impact us a great deal. We need the BBC figures to really figure out just how the move will impact us though.
Second paragraph - I hadn't thought of that. That is a massive problem.
On the plus side, there are other options. Have you ever used Trillian IM? They have some sort of thing going on with Wikipedia; every word that has a match with a Wikipedia entry is underlined, and you can hover to get the opening paragraph or click to be taken to that entry. It is done on the fly so the technology will be possible somehow.

Channels - Yes.

Multi-media content - I guess so. It's not something that interests me, so I don't see the appeal. I understand that other people do, however.
Actually, I think I would be interested in podcasts. I like reading aloud and would contribute to that. It's more like making the text available in different formats than using other formats to create new entries though, if you can see the difference in my head.

Feeds, subscriptions and syndication - Yes.


Legal


Libel - Yes.

Copyright and licensing - I agree that it should remain for now, but needs to be discussed with any new owner and with the community. And changes could potentially mean the loss of thousands of Entries.

Child Protection - Yes. Perhaps we should also have a Designated Person who would be a point of contact for any CP queries (I hesitantly put myself forward, as I've just taken on the role at work and should be learning more about this). They can then pass any details on to the police. I suggest that one of the reasons that someone can yikes a post is so that they can mark posts that make them concerned about CP issues. This can also be widened to all vulnerable people.


I hope this helps,

A caring community - I like your text. I'm not sure all would agree about the quote. h2g2 has to be balanced - if one gets too important the other shrinks, and that diminishes our overall effectiveness.

^^
Nah, scrap that. If the Guide gets bigger that's not a problem. We only have a problem if the Community overwhelms the Guide.

Vip, you are a honey and a sweetheart and a star. I'll revise the page to incorporate your suggestions, but probably not until tomorrow or the next day. Also to include paulh's comment too.

I confess my entirely unhidden agenda is to make sure that noohootoo doesn't suffer from the same gaping internal wound that bled the life out of us while we were with the BBC - ie the death-grip of the Guidelines for the Edited Guide and the bottle-neck caused by the only people who could publish Edited entries being BBC employees. It was a model which was just about ok in 2000/2001 but which drove away many many intelligent and talented writers.

I also believe that no-one understands the Guide like we do.

But, conversely, I really do think there could be so much more to what we do than what we do now. I really like the idea of a book and I'm surprised that no-one else believes in it.

Take care. Moving house sucks but remember, the pain of change is forgotten when the benefits of change are felt.



Ben

A couple of other people have mentioned the book, so you're not alone. I would just add it to the other pile of books that sound interesting but in reality just sit on my bookshelf.

People buy me things like that quite often though, so there must be a market for them (even if they're not read). They would also be good advertising.

I think we'll get there. Jordan has written some guidelines that I think are a great start. I just need to re-read them and make sure I've got everything straight in my head.

There's nothing I can do about the house - it's all out of my hands. Either they will continue with the buying process or they won't; nothing I can say or do will make a difference. Now I just have to stop fretting about it!

Should the "Company" structure be under Legal, for when the h2g2c2 takes over hootoo instead of an 'Internet Mogul' ?

Also I just read this : "... STEEPLED, adding Ethics and demographic factors ... "
Ethics and demography are also key components of h2g2.

X-cuse me for throwing more mud in already murky waters as I am learning a lot as well as time goes by and my interest in noohootoo is growing.

Hi Martin. The Pestel analysis is fo external factors, so the structure of the legal entity - beng an internal factor - is covered elsewhere. It gets a section of its own, in fact.

Ethical and demographic factors? If you can think of any specific ethical factors, do say so. I've covered child protection under Legal. The demographics of the existing site members are covered in the section describing the site itself and in the section about who writes the Guide.

You are right.
I'll just because I can only fit 1 foot in my mouth at a time.