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

Well done Waz!

I am going to go through the entry later on, and scatter through the thing, but this is a great summary of where we are to-date. I was starting to feel a little lost, scattered and confused.

B

Thanks for doing this - I will comment later on.

Sprout

Keep up the good work

Hey Guys,

Well myself and my exceptionally good lady Anna have read through the page and both agree that things are starting to form. We've given our collective feedback below in GuideML so that you can copy and paste it so that people can easily see our feedback.





In this thread there was some discussion of where we're at on Underguide issues. Sprout suggested setting up a page to list them. I thought it was a good idea. I can only do this from my perspective and I don't pretend to have read all the backlog. These are the issues that I see as undecided, or more or less decided but not quite. It would be good to cross some of these off the list and carry on discussing the more difficult issues. Maybe others see some of them as having been decided already. I've included a couple of links to where things are being discussed but may not have them all. If you think there are other issues or thread links that should be here, or any that shouldn't, please let me know.

Selection of entries

How UG entries are chosen/nominated/voted into the UG has yet to be decided. The options seem to be a proposing and seconding, (plus possible thirding), system for selecting nominated entries or a voting system with any number or a limited no. of yeas and nays up to a given deadline or up to a given total. As per GTB's UG Processes

Inhouse we prefer the nominating/seconding system. it allows for constructive feedback and also allows for generous debate should a thorny issue arise. Voting has two drawbacks - it doesn't allow for feedback (see BotF voting system) and it just adds one more layer to the administration of the project.



Will Miners have quotas? Quotas for nominating, or voting on nominated entries or a quota for both. If yes, what is the quota. Will anyone monitor this or is it left to Miners to keep to voluntarily? Will there be a minimum no. of picks/votes a Miner will be asked to commit to? Will there be a minimum no. of subbings for those who volunteer for that aspect of mining?

Quotas seem to work for both our subs and scouts schemes. To keep tabs one of the miners would maintain a calendar of who picked/subbed which entry and when.



What role do the italics have in acceptance of entries? (There is a question of the role of the UG Persona in selection/acceptance of entries, that's included in the next section. )

Our role will at first have to be limited due to our other administrative/editorial obligations. We would, however, have to look and give the final OK to any UG entry. This is because if any entry is going to be quasi-official, it will have to fit the wider BBCi Guidelines for legal reasons etc.



When entries are accepted and are listed as pending who decides on which go to the front page when. Will, and if so how will, any overlap with the Post and GAG use of such entries be taken into account. It's been suggested that a six month gap between presentation in either of these and the UG might be good.

The UG will be a quasi-official part of h2g2 and as such, when an entry enters the UG, it will have to have a status whereby any alterations can only be made by in-house staff. This is for legal requirements and applies to the Edited Guide too




This thread has discussions with Anna relating to selection and italic involvement.
Ashley's request for an update on the Underguide

Role of Core Members/ UG Persona

I'm unclear whether there is any consensus on the extent of the role of Core Members/UG Persona. Are they purely administrative or are they the Underguide Editor or something in between. They officially scout entries and return subbed entries to the Towers. GTB's outline of UG processes suggests they 'review the subbed copy and the discussion thread, ascertain that everything is in order, and copy the GuideML from the subbing copy into the Recommended Copy, over which only the UG Persona has editing rights'. Can they also reject entries they think are substandard at this point?

The UG Editor persona is vital for those tasks which have to be completed by us (eg making copies of entries etc). We could only accept entries from that persona because we'd hate to have EG and UG confused in the inhouse filing system. The UG Editors would also, we envisage, be responsible for the day-to-day administration of any yahoo group that is set-up and to approach the in-house staff with entries that have been 'mined' or real problems in the group/scheme.

Do they have a deciding voice on marginal entries, where voting reaches an impasse, or where miners start hitting each other with their candles?

Absolutely - if there is a real problem, then they can approach the inhouse team - this is why we want the persona to be in the hands of 1-3 people and no more. This is also why we like the nominating scheme because this gives scope for some really great discussion.








Do they accept Miners' volunteer applications?

Yes


Do they keep an eye on Miner behaviour down the tunnels?
Absolutely - but this is the case for the whole community. The UG will be a microcosm of h2g2. The trouble makers (and there will be some) will bubble to the surface and be dealt with. Also, you will have full access to the Yikes! button.



The only place I can remember this coming up lately is the thread linked to above.

Range of available writing and APR

Ashley (I think) wasn't altogether happy with the name Alternative Peer Review. No alternative suggestions have received much support yet.

How about 'The Underguide Review Forum'? It does exactly what it says on the tin.



General consensus seems to be that any entry except EG suitable entries and those marked 'not for review' are on limit to Miners - regardless of previous use in the Post or CAC or the presence of the author. Are any tunnels, eg journals and forum postings, off limit to Miners?

Always liaise with the Post and CAC out of mutual respect and to avoid any conflict.



There is also general consensus that all UG entries go through APR. How long do they need to be in APR before they're available for nomination? GTB has suggested a week.

All entries should go the Review Forum. In case of exceptional circumstances (Ben knows ) , in which case ask for our advice - we're here to make this work too!



Are we bothered by duplication of entries in the UG?
Only copies of UG entries should be edited... this is fundamental to how the whole system works. If a Researcher doesn't like the edit, then they have the freedom to post a link to the original.



Volunteer group.

Who runs the volunteer group? Core Members or h2 staff? Other?
We think that the 1-3 people who have the UG Editor persona should also run the group. We don't have as much time as we would like, so the more you guys can handle, the better for us and the scheme in the long run.



I think there's consensus, with some reluctance, that the group should be a closed group. Is there any disagreement on that?
It's always better to have the groups closed as you will need to discuss some issues that are a little delicate for an open forum.



Archiving/searching issues.

How will Underguide entries be shown to be Underguide entries? Is there any alternative to the simple prefix? If we use a prefix what will it be? UG has been suggested, plus points are it's short and recognisable to h2g2ers, drawback is it won't mean much to outsiders.

This is a 'status' issue which we are currently looking into.



How will UG entries be archived? Officially or unofficially or both? Presumably official archiving would be into the current h2 categories. If we have unofficial archiving what are the categories going to be? By type of writing, poetry, prose etc. or subject or both. Where would you put a nonsense poem on ducks? Jodan has made a start on this but it's difficult to get very involved without knowing the extent of official archiving there will be.

UG entries can be categorised in the 'World of h2g2' section of the system. Keep the system as loose and link free as possible to allow for growth and the state of mind of click weary Researchers.



I suggested on the 'What Volunteers Do' page that a subbing Miner might include a list of keywords at the end of a piece for search purposes since UG style entries might talk all around a subject without ever naming it. It would then never be picked up by someone searching on the subject matter. Is this worth pursuing?

Leave this for the moment while we look at other 'status' possibilities.



Most discussion on categories is at the MSN group.

The Underguide page still needs to be written.

Extent of Miners' Role/Other volunteer roles
There seems to be general consensus that Miners 'scout' and sub. Someone had the idea of author mentors. Do we want to go ahead with that, is it a Miners role, is it another volunteer group? If the latter would it be by volunteering or by invitation (by who?).

Keep it simple and let the system evolve - by over-structuring the idea, you restrict development and creativity.

Guidelines
My understanding is that there is some consensus on minimal guidelines with examples to illustrate standards, but that there is still some uncertainty on this. Also that GuideML will be required but although English usage would be the default there is no requirement for it in entries
The most recent discussion on guidelines is here.

This needs careful work. There will have to be some quality control, the UG must not become a dumping ground for any old rant/ random piece of poetry. UG entries (like every other quasi-official page) will have to be legally sound etc. These Guidelines are not restrictive. You will also need to debate swearing.

Relationship with the Post and AGG/GAG/CAC
Discretion, Intersection or Union?

All three.

A page of Underguide links
There's a guide to backlog on MSN but I found I an h2 list useful in doing the volunteer pages. So in case anyone else might find it of use; various Underguide related links.

OK - long posting coming I feel...

SELECTION

Picking vs Voting - I'm happy to go with the consensus/Italics on this. We need a system that gives thumbs up for appropriate articles within 1-3 weeks I think. Linked to this, I guess we should keep the 7 day incubation system?
Question - If we get lots of no votes for an entry that is in the right place but simply not very good, will the system come back to the author and say thanks but no thanks? Do we prefer this to the PR system where this kind of entry simply slips into limbo? I think I prefer limbo, on balance.
Quotas - We will need a firm maximum to stop a keen miner dominating the process and to encourage selectivity. I think we can simply have a suggested minimum though. Miners should adhere to this voluntarily.
Italics - they should confirm that they are happy with an entry, as per the EG. Realistically, we are not going to get near the front page without this.
Front page and when - When we only have one entry at a time, not a big problem. If we were having multiple entries, someone would need to group entries appropriately, as the italics do for the front page now. I think we need the six month gap.

ROLE OF UG PERSONA

Largely administrative, I think. The core members I am sure will have an important influence on the miners, because they have been heavily involved and have put a lot of though into this. It'll happen naturally.

RANGE OF AVAILABLE WRITING

I like APR as a name. I think we should be sensitive with regards to using journal entries and convos. Consent based for active researchers, and common sense based for the use of Elvis work.

Aside from AGG/GAG and the Post - can we pick the best bits from sleeping creative writing fora - Fiction Central etc. There is some fantastic stuff in Fiction Central in particular.

As above, seven days incubation seems right. Duplication shouldn't be a problem. If two researchers both write nice poems about flowers, we can publish both, why not?

VOLUNTEER GROUP

Who runs the group - Combination of self governing, core members and the odd steer from the Italics, I suggest.

We can start with the original volunteers and then invite candidates as and when needed. We can see how it goes on this one.

ARCHIVING

If we get an official archive, great. Otherwise, we can use something like Jodan's ideas, or the AGG/GAG classification system.

Yes to keywords.

MINER's ROLE

Mentors could be a second step I feel. Let's not stretch ourselves too thin.

GUIDELINES

Current consensus + examples seem fine to me.

Oof. Can't think of anything else. Going home for my !

Sprout

I was so long I got overtaken by Ashley! Oh well.

When I say swearing, I mean how are you going to deal with it - as the UG is part of h2g2, the same House rules apply.

It's a delicate issue that needs careful thought

<./>ThePost</.> is listening but extremely busy with a special project just now...

shazz

Cool Shazz! I though I heard the rustle of newspaper in the background.

Blimey - talk about backlog!



SELECTION OF ENTRIES


Nominations

I prefer to have a nominate/second/third system, but I am not going to fight anyone, and if the verdict is nominate/second, I will accept the democratic decision of the delegates attending the meeting
I completely agree that voting could get too complex to administrate. We can always discuss things after all.



Quotas

Ok - If we go with quotas, (and it seems good to me) we need to decide on what the quotas for recommending and for subbing are.

Let's assume that we have 12 Miners and one entry per week, and and that we want to build up a 'stockpile' of picked and subbed entries.

That would be one recommendation every four weeks if we go with Nominate/Second, or a recommendation every 3 weeks if we go with Nominate/Second/Third.

Gem Polishing (ie subbing) duties would come round maybe once a month on the basis that not all Miners want to sub. And some poor soul needs to keep track of this. Anyone volunteering for this?



Italics selecting entries

If you are going to give the once-over to the entry, when will you do this? When it has been recommended and picked? Or after it has been Polished? It seems a good idea if it is before it is Polished.



Timing of appearance on the Front Page

I assumed that this would be a task for the Italics



UG PERSONA

The Editors recommend that there are only two or three people running this account, and we have been discussing this amongst ourselves. I think the current list is running as: Deidzoeb, friendlywithteeth, Spaceman Spiff, and GTB. Both I and Waz have declined the honour. This clearly needs to be sorted, but I trust the four of them to do so without bloodshed.



RANGE OF AVAILABLE WRITING AND APR

'The Underguide Review Forum'... but then we lose the alphabetic advantage of the letter "A". But we also streamline the branding. On balance I think that Ashley is right, but I do regret the loss of 'Alternative'...

"Exceptional circumstances"? - I have no recollection of that at this moment in time. (Seriously - if "Exceptional Circumstances" are important, then you are going to have to remind me. You know my name. You know where I live!)



VOLUNTEER GROUP

I think it should definitely be a closed group. I also think that while it should be run by the Underguide Editors, it should be set up by the Editors. This provides continuity, because the BBC isn't going to leave the site, (and if it does, we all have much larger problems than the ownership of an email group). I am explicitly not going to let the current MSN group be used. (It's my ball, and I will take it to the US with me on my trip!



THE UNDERGUIDE PAGE

I think I introduced this concept in the early versions of the Volunteers' pages. Presumably this is going to be a description of the UG. fwt seems to have volunteered to write it, so I suggest we watch ftw's U-Space.



EXTENT OF MINERS' ROLE / OTHER VOLUNTEER ROLES

I was assuming that Miners would scout and sub. The Author Mentor role was a suggestion who's time has not yet come. Let's go with the things which have grabbed the collective imagination.

Waz has based the Miners' Volunteer pages on the existing ones for the Subs and Scouts, and this seems a good plan.



GUIDELINES

Ashley said: "There will have to be some quality control, the UG must not become a dumping ground for any old rant/ random piece of poetry."

Ben replies: This is why I am suggesting a nominate/second/third approach. I take the issue of quality very seriously indeed, and this is the best solution I can think of. There may be a better solution of course, but no-one has suggested one that seems better to me.



Ben

TSF

This discussion is going to be hard to follow. Is there any easier way to structure it? I was going to suggest a separate conversation thread for each question still up for debate, but that would be 15 or 20 threads.

'The Underguide Review Forum' instead of APR gets my vote. That's more descriptive than Alternative Peer Review, as long as readers know what we mean by "Underguide." And if they don't, that's what links are for.

"Always liaise with the Post and CAC out of mutual respect and to avoid any conflict."

From what I've seen in CAC discussions, the concensus seems to be UG can use anything they want from past issues of CAC. It might be a little different for entries written specifically for the Post, but there's nothing so specifically written for CAC that it would cause problems to have the entry promoted by UG later. I still like the idea of delaying use of entries in the UG for six months if they've already appeared in CAC or The Post, and possibly contacting the Post and/or the author for any entries that already appeared in the Post.

Re: author mentors. I suggest that we table that idea until the project is underway. We don't need to confuse things this early in the process by having 4-5 different subcategories of UG volunteers.

Re: swearing. I suggest by default we leave in the author's swearing, and allow Italics to judge what must or ought to be removed, or what is "editorially acceptable." (Passing the buck, but it would make things so much easier, especially when our artsy oriented UG editors will inevitably present things with Italics may object to. Better to let them decide.)

...And when I say we "leave in the author's swearing," I mean anything that hasn't been moderated already by the time Miners subed it. If it's already been moderated, then that's our answer.

Isn't there an official statement of policy on swearing somewhere? I mean, which words must have s in their eyes?

Subcom - can you ping me on one of the IM programmes? My contact details are on my U-page.

B

~jwf~

I second Ben's proposal for nominating/seconding/thirding instead of voting. Trying to count votes for and against each entry would be an administrative hassle, and it's bound to lead to long debates with little return on investment. Requiring three scouts to nominate/second/third an entry will still give us good quality entries. One nomination and a second does not seem enough.

"I am explicitly not going to let the current MSN group be used."

Ben, why? What is broken about the existing MSN group that needs to be fixed?

Ashley said: "There will have to be some quality control, the UG must not become a dumping ground for any old rant/ random piece of poetry."

My problem with stylistic guidelines is that UG material is bound to be so subjective, it's almost pointless to attempt putting in words what we want or what we're looking for. Every time someone has begun to make detailed suggestions about stylistic guidelines, it sounds like a list of formats that they don't like very much, and it always makes me wonder how soon we'll see exceptions to those rules.

We should make it clear to authors that the UG has standards and won't accept everything presented to it. But I think we would be fair to simply say it's subjective, and not bother trying to describe what might appeal to us. Giving examples or asking writers to check archives should serve the same purpose.

Reasons for not using the MSN group

1) The group includes people like Shazz who have not volunteered to be Miners, and I don't think it is appropriate to kick them out of the group.

2) I personally think that the mails there should remain a matter of public record.

3) I use groups a lot for different business and personal things and I will eventually come up against space issues - especially if I am putting photos from the road trip into and MSN group

4) I think that the Miners' group should be opened by the BBC - that way there is no issue if I get run over by a greyhound bus when I go jaywalking on the New Jersey Turnpike. Seriously - there are stability issues which go away if the group is at least set up by the Editors.

So - it ain't broke, but it ain't entirely fit for purpose either.

B

UG Page:
So what you want is like a UG Front Page almost? A 'this is where you go if you want to find out what the UG is'? Just making sure!

Guidelines:
Perhaps what we need instead of guidelines is a series of pieces: 'this is what makes a good....' [poem, personal account, fiction piece etc.] In here, we can put general points such as 'be balanced' in the personal account page. If you like this idea, we'd have to get a general consensus of what 'does' make a good....

You may not like this idea, but I think it has it's merits: we can put general things down that don't curb any creativity, and we can also point out that a good and original piece could also not adhere to any of these points and still be a fantastic piece: these are just general help-along-the-waypaths.

Nominations:
I've suggested an administrative way of nominating pieces on the MSN site...

UG Persona:
This seems to be the bone of contention at the moment... I've addressed the others on the MSN group, so we'll have to wait and see what happens! I notice the others haven't really said they feel about the UG Persona...

Volunteer Forum:.
Agreed it should be a different one: but yahoo or hotmail?

My [All that for only : I'm such good value! ]

FwT

Hey Ben et al,

Some more thoughts

SELECTION OF ENTRIES


Nominations

>>> I prefer to have a nominate/second/third system, but I am not going to fight anyone.

I think thirding is fine - as long as it is not a simple yay/nay vote



Italics selecting entries

>>> If you are going to give the once-over to the entry, when will you do this? When it has been recommended and picked? Or after it has been Polished? It seems a good idea if it is before it is Polished.

I think to save everyone some work, this should be once it is recommended and before it has been polished.



Timing of appearance on the Front Page

>>> I assumed that this would be a task for the Italics

When you build up your stockpile you can then plan a calendar which we can both work from.




RANGE OF AVAILABLE WRITING AND APR

>>> 'The Underguide Review Forum'...

I feel like a real rotter - I think for newbies this is a great title - byut nothing is fixed in stone.

>>> "Exceptional circumstances"?

By this I mean those entries that could cause offence, that may be seen to incite racial hatred, those full of swear words etc.



VOLUNTEER GROUP

>>> I think it should definitely be a closed group ... US with me on my trip!

Agreed





GUIDELINES

>>> There may be a better solution of course, but no-one has suggested one that seems better to me.

Agreed - what I think has to be made clear is that there is an editorial line that must be drawn, ultimately by us inhouse (as they are for the EG.