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

Yes, that is a good point - it can be something of an invasion of privacy.

B

Yes, but I made a decision pretty early on about whether I'd mind people being able to work out who I am, from what I wrote about and said on my personal space - and in my case, there aren't that many Plymouth Argyle fans from Staffordshire who work for BBC Sport so the answer was no, I don't mind.

As long as we encourage people to bear that sort of thing in mind and make a conscious choice, I don't see too much of a problem...

OK - not everyone. Most researchers though. You don't have to state it is your home town on the thread remember, nor does it have to be where you live right now.

Sprout

so, apart from adding something to A530902 about choosing where you live (or similar localised subjects ie hobbies, jobs, etc) anything else spring to mind that we should be mentioning?

oops that should have been choosing those as possible subject for your first article.

yes but can i get back to you?!

Mort

sure. fi we can come up with something usefull between us, then we should be able to make a difference.

If I remember right, the proposal on how to chuck people out took a few weeks, so there is no great rush.

justgive me some idea of where it needs to change, and I will see what I can do.

number six, i think a guide about writing geographical entries would be a great idea. i'd be willing to help if you like

i don't think geographical entries necessarily give away an author's location... i've come across several entries that were written by people who don't live where they're writing about. geographical entries, like any other, require only an interest in the subject, a desire to learn more about the place in question. the entry on chattanooga which graced the front page yesterday (and i missed it!) was written simply because i knew i would be going there and i was looking for information on what there was to do while i was there. i don't even live in the same time zone some would say this detracts from the quality of the entry, but it's a much better entry than the one written by a native that i found in the flea market.

an alternative to writing a general geographic entry would be to write about a specific attraction in your hometown, such as a museum, theater, historic landmark, excellent restaurant, market, park, fair, etc.

xyroth, i've had a look at your page. altho it's a bit outdated (they don't still use the sin bin, do they?) it does contain lots of good information.

however it seems to be suggesting the social or 'community' end of the guide as the starting place with writing your own entries as a last resort, and makes the edited guide seem quite a lofty aspiration. i think it would need a major rewrite to accomplish what we're trying to do.

unless i'm misunderstanding our goal... while not detracting from the community end of the guide we're trying to promote the edited guide and make it more appealing to newcomers, right?

if nobody beats me to it i'll see what i can come up with to this end later this week. in the end we can take all the suggestions and cram them together in a singular presentation.

Hi Everyone

- All good discussion here - Abi and I have talked about this and we're working on some guidelines. The embryonic form of which is here A1055981 which compiles your ideas expressed here.

- I love the idea of adding a line to the acceptance email. 'Why not celebrate your success by helping someone else with an entry in Peer Review? Every comment helps to build the Guide!'

- Re the idea about requiring people to comment in PR before they can post... Good point about gaming the system, but I'm also not sure we can force requirements on newbies. It's another stumbling block. Another reason to put them off contributing. I know we want them to be contributing in the right way, but it's a bit like saying 'you can't play until you know the rules'. People want to kick the ball about before they plunge in...

- Also, perhaps <./>writing-beginners</.> should be renamed to How you can write for the Guide. It does just about cover everything to do with contributing and if there's anything that's missing, let me know.



Anna

Mort

Hi brolean.

it does indeed push the comunity end first, and is also a bit out of date, but it had the advantage of being available and not completely irrelevent.

also, a lot of the stuff that ends up discouraging newbies is because they post to peer review without visiting the community stuff.

examples that I have seen recently entered into peer review include journel entries, stuff suitable for the post or the alternative writing workshop, or stuff by people who have never read any edited guide entries or peer review threads and are thus completely shocked by what happens there.

the path I proposed would get them into writting (always hard to do) while only slowly adding to the levels of criticism that they get.

much better than having their first post being to start a peer review thread, and getting frightened off.

When I have some other suggestions for how to change it, I will update it.

I do think we need to grow our new members into taking part in the community, first in general threads, and secondly in peer review threads, before they submit an entry to peer review. I think that will make it much more likely that we will keep them.

>>I do think we need to grow our new members into taking part in the community, first in general threads, and secondly in peer review threads, before they submit an entry to peer review. I think that will make it much more likely that we will keep them.

I think you have hit on what, for me, is an important point there, Xyroth. The model for h2g2 is 'read, talk, contribute' and this learning process is part of what makes the site sticky. Some may stick at any point in the curve, but hopefully some will go on to become long term contributors.

Some (hopefully) pertinent comments of mine are on the sister 'Fluffiness' thread.

B

One piece of advice that was drummed into me at the Writing group I used to go to in RL was that in any piece of writing, the author should 'show more than tell' and I think that applies here.

A lot of the ideas that have been posted here are very good, and I know that on the writing guidelines there are links to articles that are shown as examples of good EG writing.

One thing I'd like to see is on the Aces greeting is a link to the Random Edited Entry, just to get a flavour of the kind of writing in the guide, (and the good thing about that is that it will give them a different article every time.)

I think one other thing i have noticed, being a relative newbie compared to the others who have contributed to this discussion, is that sometimes the comments from the more experienced people can be tired (If I have to say use guideml one more time type thing) and sometimes appear a tad caustic. This will intimidate newbies even more (I am just contrary so I stuck my nose in anyway so I think it is important to think about the potential audience even for the comments, especially if it is early in a PR thread and therefore not clearly in context.


Well that's my opinion anyway

I hang about Peer Review a lot, and one thing rapidly becomes clear. Some people cannot take criticism, no matter how mildly it is expressed or how encouragingly it is phrased. Some people become abusive if the quality of their writing is threatened. Others are unable to express disagreement.
F48874?thread=268974&post=3350366#p3350366

I think the name Peer Review needs some thought, people seem to think that it means they can bung in whatever they're thinking about and we'll all enjoy their blinding wit.

There are many examples of this but here's a recent mild one A1041120

And this statement - "Everyone can and should do an article on their local town or area." is patently untrue. There is a certain form of instant gratification contributer who rattle off some immediate thought about where-ever they are living and drop it into Peer Review.
Often badly written and ill-considered.

It was the entries on my home-town that a H2G2 search threw up that persuaded me to write one - and which led to my learning a lot about my home town I did not previoulsy know.

Rather than encouraging newbies to immediately produce an entry, I think we should be stressing the value of research - BEFORE submission.

I would actually advise against giving the link to "random edited guide entry" to newbies as an example, if only because a decent chunk of the EG entries from the first year wouldn't have made it through Peer Review. Actually, as we're going through the update system with the very oldest entries, we've had to remove the EG status on a few of the worse ones.

Anyway, when I'm coming across newbies who seem to need some guidance on what's an EG entry and what's not, I generally try to find a couple of entries I think might appeal to them, and provide the links to those (based on the info in their personal space or whatever they've posted so far, etc.). Admittedly, this requires more work.

The Writing Guidelines themselves do provide some examples of EG entries, but getting newbies to actually look at the Writing Guidelines seems like a bit of a lost cause. I seem to have a bit more luck when I target the entry to the newbie -- if the title is something they're interested in, they're more likely to go and have a read than if it's something entitled "Writing Guidelines".


Mikey

I'm right with you concerning the Random Edited Entry idea Mikey - I was about to post it as a link in a PR thread this very evening to a newbie who has submitted an unsuitable entry before activating their PS. Before submitting the post I previewed it and tried the link. Here's the first edited entry it threw up A92495

There's no way that would make it through PR today and it would be a ghastly example to a newbie of what to write for the EG.

Re: post 37 - I finally went ahead and did it.

As many of you already know, the Royal h2g2 Geographical Entry Society is over at A1286886.

All comments and new members very welcome.

Part of the idea is to aim our advice at newbies or researchers who want to write their first article for the EG - ACEs, what do you think?

Cheers,
Number Six

Just had a look. Brilliant self-starter and excellent Community-driven intiative.