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

The longer version of the "relatively pointless" comment is in the Askh2g2 thread or one of the many others the italics insisted we split into which now makes it difficult to remember where.

OK, it's off-topic here but... pointless because of:
- hit and run authors who have left the building
- authors who ignore feedback (never respond or make any corrections)
- authors who dispute feedback without having valid references of their own, become irritable, complain, don't make corrections and nobody else (sub-editor or editor) checks the thread, verifies the corrections with another expert and makes them.

You wouldn't have to use a categorisation system to read entries just because it existed. One of my other ideas was RandomPeerReview. That could probably be promoted to newbies as well as scouts. "Contribute to the guide the easy way by reading a work in progress at random and then try to tell the author at least one thing you like about it and one thing you might change to improve it."

I have read the threads, I have no wonderful ideas, just a few points that crosses my mind.

I'm all in favor to encourage new users to write articles to be for the guide. Writing for the guide to be considered as an edited entry can be a daunting thing.
My concern is… Welcome greetings from Aces will get overlong, risking becoming spam.
All Aces will be reading the users personal space, etc before Aceing, and will guide likely writers in the direction of peer review as well as their area's of interest.
Suggesting that a New user may like to contribute may have more unusable entry's being sent to peer review.

Lightman

I think an ACEing would have to become very long to be classified as spam. I read every word of mine (which was largely insane and very lengthy), and still use it for the occasional useful link. I bet 90% of lost newbies do the same.

I take the point about the unusable entries, though, which certainly is a possibility. I would suggest a link to Writing-Beginners instead.

B

Actually, I've just read Writing-Beginners, and somebody really ought to change the line about:

"The University of Life publishes new projects every week"



B

I sometimes linked to Writing-Guidelines as it is a bit insulting to refer to all researchers as beginners (within the context of writing etc). Both pages link to each other though.

Yeah, I know what you're saying - I just think <./>Writing-Guidelines<./> is a bit too dry to be shoving at Newbies, though.

B

Yeah but at least it reduces the chance of inappropriate material being sent to PR...
Does PR need ACE promotion when Goo and Alabaster have a default advert for it...?
Is PR really the kinda place to send new researchers...? I don't think my own and SEF's negative experiences of PR are unique...

I think all ACEs can do to help is promote the <./>Writing-Guideline</.> and hope that PR regulars do more to help themselves by making it a friendlier and satisfying experiance to be a part of.

I guess F19585?thread=270267&post=3452119 is as relevant to this thread as it is to the one I posted it in

I think we have located at least one major problem

F19585?thread=277119&latest=1 Post 35

...And that from a Researcher who has been here some 18 months.

Maybe a banner re-design is in order, hmmm?

B

Why not just get rid of it and put the option to search the guide/forums/for friends in the banner instead?

I would quite a link to The Post somewhere like that

I think we have all agreed that encouraging newbies to get involved in the EG is a good thing. In the least to make them aware that it exists.

However, to avoid confusion i think that the other workshops have to be mentioned too, to prevent non EG stuff getting submitted to PR.

They just dont read the guidelines clearly enough, particularly if they are HHGTTG fans as they expect it to be full of wacky entries, which of course it isnt.

I have had a look again at
<./>writing-guidelines</.>
<./>writing-beginners</.>
<./>contribute</.>

and dont think that any of them are that good for the specific use of introducing newbies to the guide. (good for other stuff but not newbies) Of course this is just my opinion, and if anyone knows of any other possible pages for linking then it would be great to see a link here to look at.

I dont want to be accused of 'dumbing down' but it has to be something that all newbies can feel they can get involved in, and those that get the idea quickly will easily move on to the more detailed explanations of what the EG (or other workshops) has to offer and how they can get involved.

People that have joined h2g2 for the EG side of it will make the effort to understand the process. But as far as i am aware, what we also want is to open the EG up to researchers that may not have heard of it or would have otherwise not really been interested in it. These newbies, i think need a more inviting introduction to the EG process.

Mort

Mort:

A long while back I thought there had to be a better way of handling banning people from the site. I knocked up a page describing how I thought it should be done. That page mutated slightly to the current official transgressions procedure, used not only on h2g2 but I'm told other dna sites also.

Some time after that I got annoyed with the quality of feedback in PR, and wrote a sarcastic entry entitled "How to comment in Peer Review". I later removed some of the more vituperative bits and offered it as a serious suggestion. What I wrote is now part of the PR page.

If you think there's a need for a page to help get newbies into contributing more, and more constructively - write it. I can tell you from personal experience that the staff are open to suggestions by that route, and there'll be no shortage of feedback on it from other people. If you're not sure what to put - put anything. You can hack it into shape with help, but the important thing is to provide a starting point for that discussion.

Best of luck.

H.

Thanks Hoovooloo,

It was mentioned in the ACEforum but since this thread has started here then it seemed appropriate to bring it up again.

I have always found the italics very open and willing to listen to suggestions. I think that alot of ACEs probably have an opinion on this and it would be great if we could get a bit more feedback from more of them, so all ideas can be thrown about, generally hurled at each other and then something created

I am a great believer in offering possible solutions whilst critising something, so i am prepared to put my money where my mouth is and offer any help with this.

H!

Hi hoovooloo.

here is something I put together a while ago, which may form the basis for discussion that you suggest.

A530902 - getting the best from the guide

it got stopped working on at the time due to the paucity of comments in the writting workshop, but I would be prepared to go back to developing it if there is any interest.

Hi Mort, xyroth, Hoovooloo and Everyone,

Am listening in, let me know when you've got something more

Anna

I think encouraging newbies to write about where they live is a *potentially* great idea - I've always been very keen on entries about what places are like and what there is to do there, as I'd got the idea that it was a major part of DNAs vision of what h2g2 could and should be.

My first h2g2 entry was about where I live... in fact, when I first checked out h2g2 I found there was already an entry on Walthamstow, and left feeling there was nothing more I could help with - in fact, it was only when I'd moved to Harringay that I came back to h2g2 and wrote the entry on that. Since becoming a Scout, I've made a bit of a point of encouraging all geographical entries and helping authors to improve them, and have tried to pick at least one geographical entry with every round of picks that I've made.

Geographical entries done well are a great thing - but the trouble is that on average only about a third of the ones that come to PR at the moment are any good. The rest either make for very boring reading, as the writer dismisses their hometown, having lived there for too long and got tired of it, or make little sense to those that don't already live there.

With that in mind, I've been wondering for a while if I should try and write a page specifically talking about things to bear in mind for entries describing a place - there are a few bits of advice (some of which I was given myself, by Gosho...) that I keep giving in PR.

Does this sound like a good idea?

I suppose the main point I'm making here, though, is to say that encouraging newbies to write about where they live *could* be a great thing for the Edited Guide - *but* experience shows that unless some specific guidance with regard to how to do a good one is offered, then it could just be a big waste of time for all concerned...

Good idea. Be happy to help.

Everyone can and should do an article on their local town or area.

Sprout

I'd be happy to accept, sprout.

"Everyone can and should do an article on their local town or area."

Not if it's already been done (as has already been pointed out) and not if it means revealing too much about their location, eg especially for a small village and in combination with their nickname and even more importantly if they are underage.