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

Are the hissy fits over? Can we get back to coming up with something constructive?

Right.

We don't want to discourage anyone from writing for the Guide, because frankly, we're low on entries. But we do want to discourage *bad* entries.

So what shape are the writing workshops in? Is there enough feedback there? It seems people are being referred there quite often, but does this actually help or just make it someone else's problem?

I have to say, I think it's a shame that a lot of valid points have been lost in squabbling here. PR has always been a place that invokes passions, and it's much easier to have a debate if we footinooti. I haven't heard that used for a while, either

FM makes a lot of valid points that I think would have been better received if someone else had been making them. Perhaps the most pertinent is the idea of leading by example; for example, if you want more content-related comments on entries, the best way to do that is to get in there and do it, and encourage others to do the same. Write the entries you'd most like to read. If you like collaborations, find people to collaborate with. And if you see something you really love on the Front Page, tell the author. There's nothing more special than having a great comment on one of your Entries on FP day.

I'll go through a few of Icy's points here:

Post 2 (Elentari): What action would you propose we take to identify and process the material hidden in unedited entries?

I think I'm right in saying that this was the original purpose of the Scouts, to go and find unedited content and bring it to the Sub-editors' attention. I'm not suggesting that we go back to those days, of course, but this approach could still work - there are probably some great pieces of writing there just waiting to be found (I recently subbed Newton Poppleford, which was found in such a fashion). Dig up some unedited entries, give them a polish, and get them in for review. (I wouldn't suggest they go to Fleamarket, which largely gets ignored, but it could be fun to trawl the depths for good work.)

If you want to base this, or indeed any other good ideas that need a home, at the Researchers' Group for now, that's fine. That idea has stagnated somewhat and isn't encouraging anyone to write more, I don't think. It may as well have a purpose, and I'd be quite happy to change the page around if it's of any use.

Post 17 (FM): a) What actions would you take to remove the Douglas Adams influence?

I'm on stony ground here, but I half-agree.

I wouldn't remove the influence. But I've found that, when I try to explain what we do on h2g2 to friends and family, I'm talking about Adams and HHGG and they nod along, interested in what I do but not the site itself. I have four friends who would make damn good Researchers for various reasons, who talk to me *about* the site but have never had an urge to get involved. They know I'm an Adams fan and see the site as a sort of Adams clique, regardless of how much I tell them about the online beerfests and so on.

However, that isn't a PR issue; it's a wider site issue, how we promote ourselves, how we can draw people in and - most importantly - keep them here. We need to find writers, and not just people who love Adams's work, and I'm not even going to pretend to have answers to that one.

Post 3 (GB): How should we enforce Scouts either doing the job or quitting? Do you mean change the description of scouting in the Volunteer pages, or create a new Volunteers Code of Conduct, or something?

I agree, but it would be very hard to police. I think I've always been fairly ethical with my badges and have given them up when I can't do the job any longer, and I *think* most people are. If there was a queue of Scouts and Subs, it would be easy to ask more from volunteers knowing there were replacements at hand, but with no new blood you have to make the most of what you have. You can say the same about writers; it's easier to pick the cream of PR with six pages of submissions than one.

Post 19 (GB): Re keeping PR comments to the subject in hand - How would you enforce/communicate this to reviewers? On one of the help pages?

Create a culture where it's frowned on to have massive topic drift and chat. Direct them to pages such as this, Ask/Misc, Personal Spaces or Talking Points to have their opinions heard. Explain that it makes it harder for the Sub to pick up on unaddressed points. A couple of posts of chat is generally ok, I think, but it should be considered poor etiquette to natter away for twenty posts.

Post 23 (FM): a) Re Allow people to say what they like in PR - What actions would you take in h2g2 to make this happen?

b) Re Reviewers to apply discretion - again, what would you do to make this happen?

These two are inseparable, in my view. I think we always need to have a bit of discretion in PR, but we always need to have the freedom to say we don't like something without ever having to worry about personal repercussions. It's just common-sense - feel free to say my submissions are awful by my usual exquisite standards, but if there's a newbie who has done a half-decent job, be much gentler.

With new Researchers, I'd like to see more flexibility in PR. Instead of recommending the entry is submitted to EGWW, where it will be ignored, why not keep it in PR for more suggestions? If a new Researcher submits an article to PR when it should be in AWW, why not invite the UnderGuide guys over to help work on it rather than confuse the Researcher by telling them to move it about all over the place? There's no massive need to declutter PR at the moment, so I'm sure there is room for accommodating those few that shouldn't be there as long as the Researcher is active and making changes.

The idea of relaxing first-person rules is an interesting one, and I think it's a reflection of how we see the Edited Guide in relation to the Guide as a whole. The Edited Guide is seen as the cream of the crop, with extensive guidelines detailing what should make it and what shouldn't. If we're going to continue to see it in that respect, we should widen the guidelines, because we almost lost an EotM winner, A30081700, because of overzealous reviewing. We should allow more leeway in writing rather than put people off, and the 'how' is to use the Scouts email group more - it was chronically underused for debate in my last stint there. The alternative is to see UnderGuide and Post articles as just as valuable as EG Entries so that 'not suitable for the EG' becomes 'more suitable for the UnderGuide/Post'.

I'd also, somewhat controversially perhaps, relax the 'completeness' rule. I could write a great Entry on Tendaba Camp in The Gambia, but although I know it was originally a hunting lodge, I don't know when it was set up or by whom, and it's very difficult to find something like that out. I'd get nailed on those points in PR, so it's not worth me writing it. Would it be better to leave some more obscure entries slightly incomplete than not have them at all?

Finally, on a vaguely-related point, we could have a thread on the Researchers' Group for Scouts to post the latest FM removals. The more publicity we get for them, the more likely it is that someone will take one up.

Post 27 (FM): Re Everyone writes about an aspect of their home town - how should we make this happen?

Challenge.

Post 30 (FM): Re Champion *anything* that serves to broaden h2g2's appeal and audience - What should we do to achieve this?

We're trying to do this with the Aviators (over 5,500 hits on YouTube alone now) and I came up with some suggestions in the Talking Point.

Could we promote the site ourselves? If we write, say, a piece on an aspect of local history, send a link to the local museum? Or local schools?

One thing we could do would be to publish a h2g2 book. Why not? The BBC won't do it, but we could do it ourselves if we got permission from the relevant writers and the Editors. We could self-publish a book, and donate the profits to Save the Rhino, perhaps. It's fairly straightforward to do, and I'd be happy to cover the initial outlay if I could recover it through sales - once I'd broken even, everything else would go to a charity of DNA's posthumous choice. Just a thought.

***

I'll finish up with a few thoughts about the Researchers' Group.

I think it was a good idea, but it only had a short-term effect. I've noted elsewhere that a regular commitment is often hard to keep up, especially when you're short of inspiration, that most people who signed up have struggled to do very much, and that the people who are contributing and posting probably would've been anyway.

Look at PR now and you'll see that the idea that such a group could keep it going unsupported was pie in the sky.

I don't want it to become a talking shop - this forum does that brilliantly - but if anyone does have a good idea looking squarely at Elentari take it on and I'll put it in there. Rather than start something new, let's take the contributors we already have there and add a little extra inspiration. I think ideas that aren't time-pressured, such as the idea of searching the unedited guide for material, would have a great home there.

***

Blimey, I do go on, eh?

"One thing we could do would be to publish a h2g2 book."

That's a great idea that I hear time and time again - but have never had the foggiest idea of how to start. It's an idea with legs, that's for sure.

*looks around*

I assume you mean what I said about some sort of column or thread about great unedited entries and flea market gems?

I do have a month off so it is something I could do, at least in the short term. We need to decide where the best place to hold it would be.

It would be quite straightforward, Psycorp, if we could get the copyright issues sorted. I read Mark Moxon's book, which he self-published, and asked him how he did it, so I'm fairly clued-up

I suggested, at least initially, starting a thread on A28763472, Elentari. I'm quite happy for that page to be used to see if ideas have legs, and I'll add sections to it if any of these blindingly good ideas take off.

Thanks all, particularly you, Rich - some good practical suggestions in there.

You mentioned using the Scouts e-mail group more to discuss PR issues, but not all reviewers are Scouts, of course. I'll throw in a suggestion that off-line discussion groups are widened somehow to include non-Scouts, maybe an h2g2 Peer Reviewers group.

Keep the suggestions coming - I'll leave this going over the weekend.

Icy

I'm shamelessly stealing Pinniped's suggestion in post 21 of F48874?thread=5475211

It's time for a fresh set of specimen entries listed in the Writing Guidelines, and selecting them might even provide a way of promoting the Edited Guide.

BBC runs loads of local radio stations ~ is there a way to involve them in what we're producing - or better yet for them to involve us ?

My daughter is a teacher, and when she was looking for some stuff on Coventry I pointed her at my entries on h2g2 - the kids liked them - and the other teachers now look on h2g2 for something different to Wiki - which a lot of them are suspiscious of. In other words, a bit of self-promotion can help.

Probably a stupid suggestion i will throw it out there anyhow

On the same lines of need a name but it has to be serious Suggestions..need a entry if people are struggling for something to write about as i often have try to get a list of entries that haven't been done

From post #10 - "Revive the "First Solo Entries" column in the Post (A10310941)"

Why??? Who took any notice, or read them before? It seemed like no one. Hardly any, if any of those 'First Solo Entries' pages have a single post at the bottom of them, it felt like I was wasting my time.

Then along comes B, (nothing personal or any offense intended here B ) with his 'Entry of The Month' suggestion, with added condition, of not doing EoTM unless it included a badge and mention on front page. It took a while, and persistence on B's part, but he got it.

When it's case of who shouts the loudest gets the recognition (for the authors of Edited Entries), with my little voice, I'm on a loser every time.

Emmily

A few thoughts. Maybe a bit of a scratched record this, but impressions of my first weeks here still seem pretty valid, even though it's nearly seven years ago now.

On >>Champion *anything* that serves to broaden h2g2's appeal and audience - What should we do to achieve this?<<

*Anything* is what h2g2's good at. PR and the EG are the one prescriptive part. There's a simple choice here: we either keep declaring the EG as-is to be the central project, or we champion *anything*. I'm in favour of the latter, accepting anything whatsoever into the EG subject to just three conditions: 1. that there's a PR consensus that it's good, 2. that it doesn't give offence and 3. that it's original.

(btw, I had a little punt into PR with a quite-unsuitable. It's been a year since I tried it, and even longer since Jims took it personally, and the friendly spirit of this thread seemed to invite it. So it's all right, I hope)

The h2g2 Book - great idea. What proportion of it's content should be Edited Entries though? I'd suggest 50% tops.

Resigning Scouts? Maybe I should. I certainly don't do it properly, either in terms of commenting or of meticulous picking. If we all did it properly, though, we could cut back to one really hard-working Scout with a nice big paste buffer, 'cos all the calls would be exactly the same. Tell you what: I'm prepared to resign if you let me choose who it's to be. OK?

Last thing - there seems to be distress about FM's comments. A bit over-sensitive, IMO, since the guy is principled and consistent, and nowhere near being the Rudest Researcher. In my day getting into a pointless spat with that august Researcher (among others) was a rite of passage. Maybe we need an "I've been ripped to shreds by FM" badge?

I have not had as much time to follow these discussions as I really would wish to. How-ever, a suggestion that the BBC staff might ponder as an option:

When creating a new "A" page, an entry of what-ever sort ... Add a couple of options at the top or bottom.

"Submit to Peer Review"
"Submit to Under Guide"
"Submit to Alternative Writing Workshop"
"Keep entry private to your own zone"

Each with some sort of descriptive, very brief and concise but enough to know where things might fit.

Don't think that ought to happen right when they're created - I like to let an entry "ferment" for a day or two before I send it off to PR...

I haven't done one for a time, but doesn't every new A-page give the option of submit to PR, do NOT allow review, or generally leave it alone? I was suggesting perhaps a few clearly explained options, ... For those newbies that like to click buttons. Atleast they may have an idea what they are clicking for, without resorting to a lot of levels of help pages here.

I think this is one of the problems with h2g2 - everything beyond the borders pretty much blends in. The 'Not For Review' tick box doesn't exactly make its presence felt, and many of the other options when submitting an entry are a tad reclusive.

I know that it flies in the face of accessibility but I reckon a pop up box for these options would be preferable.

Also, their should be an option to submit an entry to the Underguide. At the moment I'm still not sure how one gets an entry in there!

EDIT: there was an unruly 'there' masquerading as a 'their' in there.

"Also, their should be an option to submit an entry to the Underguide. At the moment I'm still not sure how one gets an entry in there!"

The Alternative Writing Workshop <./>RF5</.>. It's very much like PR in format, actually. One doesn't submit things to the UG, it goes to the AWW, and there are a few places it can go from there, the UG being one of them.

And how does a newbie find that? Just as a point of interest?

That has been something that UnderGuiders have always struggled with. The link is sometimes on the FP, I think.

I think we are drifting a bit here. Many places and options of the site are there to be found, but very few of them easily. And I know threads have existed to beat that idea to death.

But that is one reason I bring up the idea of several very clearly defined options of what to do, once a person has created an entry ... Where or how to send it? Currently, there is PR or nowhere, if I recall. So there are a lot of totally wrong bits appearing in PR.