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

"Isn't a personal message from the editors more work than a badge?"

Perhaps (though it could be copy and pasted) - but is does deal with the issue in my post just above.

Do we want new writers or not?

Yes!!!

Re: Emmily's discontinued First-time Authors column in the Post



Emmily posted her views on it in a previous "Quality of PR" discussion - see Post 70 here:

F3719964?thread=5500615?thread=&show=200

So perhaps the authors could be encouraged individually rather than through some promise of fame via

How about fame via the FP? Just add a note if it's a first-time entry?

Find ways to use challenge h2g2 more. Don't need the t-shirts and stuff, just a place to discuss and find gaps in the guide which need filling.

Related note: on home-town-rough-guide entries, that should be a permanent challenge, with some links to any particularly groovy examples... Err, isn't there some sort of h2g2 geographical society???

Just cos there is already an entry on london, doesn't mean h2g2 couldn't use another.... for instance, A6681062 only has links to entries about 4 of the however many boroughs.

/Disclaimer: I live in a city not currently covered by the EG. I keep on telling myself to sort it out...
//Hangs head in shame.

Personally, I think we need to avoid flooding the Guide with too many similar Entries in a row, so "everyone write about your hometown" would get boring fast!

Agreed - we need to encourage writers with a range of interests and backgrounds to write for the site. It's more than just a guide to localities.

Some people see things like restaurant guides as the heart and soul of the Edited Guide. I find them terribly boring. So if it were reduced to encouraging one aspect, we'd lose people fast rather than gaining new writers...

Well, I didn't write my first entry for the promise of a badge - just to see if I could make the grade or not. A badge for just one entry seems a bit patronising - or desperate! 25 entries before the first badge does seem a rather impossible amount to achieve so maybe one at the tenth mark would be more realistic? And as to whether it is applied retroactively - why not make an announcement that researchers could claim these new badges? Then it would only apply to the current membership. And a lot less work to implement.

Although I would have loved an illustration Mala, I was happy to take a photo myself, and have got recognition for this on a page somewhere...but in the future I would be delighted to have it illustrated if the subject matter lent it self to artwork rather than photography.

Lanza

Another point - the Entry of the Month - I've voted once or twice, but the system is not very well publicised and doesn't seem to have much life in it. In fact I can't for the life of me remember where the link to it is - I'd have to search for it. Does it really make a difference to the wider membership?

Perhaps we should ask the Eds for an link on the FP asking for votes -
just above the 'On this day', below the three entries. If there is still not an increase in voting then it should be dropped as pointless.

I still think we need to think of how to persuade a wider variety of people to write for the guide though - one thing that crossed my mind is the length of more recent articles. I've noticed that years ago the length of edited entries was often much shorter. Maybe if the scouts made a point of picking shorter entries?

With regards to things like the Entry of the Month competition, I think there's a need for a central place for users to find links to a variety of that features that require regular audience participation. A sort of Time Out for h2g2, telling you the highlights of what's going on right now, so that everyone can get involved.

I couldn't agree more strongly with that Alex, at the moment the place is like a maze - very interesting in parts but a lot like the castle in Ghormengast - unused and dusty with old and forgotten places at every turn. No wonder new members take a few visits and then give up?

Icy, Mala & others - thank you for responding to my waffle.

Badges - they didn't enter my head as an incentive, but it may well work for lots of people Good idea. Perhaps after 10 articles?

As for The Stretcher & Entry of the Month competitions being seen as a possible disincentive:

Entry of the Month is surely similar to asking people 'what is your favourite book?' Everyone is going to have different views, that's just how it goes. So, this is not a personal disincentive, but I can appreciate how it might be to some.

The Stretcher 'competition element' is surely between those who are actually participants, though, no?

I actually love this kind of thing as I am exposed to all different sorts of writing on subjects I would never have heard of otherwise. And from very good writers, as a standard to perhaps aim, rather than feel totally inferior to/intimidated by.

>>One thing I've been concerned about is that people think they have to be a brilliant writer to have an entry published. This simply isn't the case -<<

Thank you God, or whatever.

I think that really may be at the heart of one of the problems (or at least, my problem). However, finding your own style is difficult - eg it's taken me bluddy ages to get this down on paper (you've probably already noticed that I'm no debator). Therefore, perhaps encouraging a researcher to try a few peices in the Under Guide & using that as a stepping stone to EGEs may be beneficial.
They may find that UG or AWW just isn't suited to them & prefer the more factual pieces of EGEs.
So maybe encouraging writing of any sort & ensuring that newbies actually know *where* to submit them to could be somewhere start? I've seen a few who appeared totally deflated if someone says that their piece is unsuitable for the EG.

GuideML not a prerequisite - good stuff

Well, it's always in - but not in every issue. Perhaps it would help if we did put the *same* article in every edition as long as voting is going on?

Problem is, if I say 'who wants to work with me on making a guide to the week-to-week highlights of hootoo', everyone will be too busy and unenthusiastic, plus the first edition will be terribly under-subscribed as it will just be yet another page on this maze-like website.

There must be some better way than having a few people sweat over making a guide to the guide. Some sort of user participation must be possible.

The Entry of the Month competition does get mentioned on the h2g2 Front Page a couple of times each month. It also has it's own 'named entry' tag EntryOfTheMonth (which takes you to the archive). It's in the h2g2 Post every month. In this week's Post there's an interview with Opti where I talk about it. I change my tagline to promote EotM (when I remember) and Galaxy Babe mentions it in her journal.

But I agree, it doesn't get promoted enough Maybe the audience is just too small. The Stretcher competition has a similar problem with attracting votes.

Hmmm - I'm not sure about using the AWW as a "stepping stone" to writing EGEs. It's a totally different style, and if anything, writing good fiction is harder, because you can't rely on being able to research...

That's why I think collaborative Entries with a set topic on the FP would be good - allow people to contribute, but not have to face PR for their first contribution. Something people just "know" - we've had ones for recipes, or holiday customs, or things like that.

Collaborative entries are a very good idea, but none of the recent topics seem to have been written up. There's even one or two in the Flea Market.

The 'Topic of the Week' has produced some good Entries in the past (I know - I've compiled a few )

The issue here is that someone still has to *write* the Entry. It's not enough simply to take a load of random posts and string them together (well, you can do that, but it will hardly make a satisfactory Entry...) That means that someone has to take the lead. In the olden days, the Italics used to do it, but there's no chance of that happening now. *Somewhere* on the site there's a list of old topics of the week that never got written up. For many, this was because they didn't draw enough responses and whoever wrote it up would effectively be writing a solo Entry from scratch with a few contributions from other Researchers.