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

Having been AWOL for 4 months some things on hootoo are jumping out at me: Curiousity #1 A thread I started 3 years, one month and two days ago is still active and now has 10351 posts in it. And counting... http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/alabaster/F2137311?thread=261203&latest=1

I lot of us have set up accounts at Live Journal and Blogger.

Just had to do that .


az

Pardon?

curiosity #2 kea can't spell any more.


I spent a full 5 minutes before I posted the journal looking at the title trying to figure out if it was wrong. Duh



JEllen, has anyone compiled a list of h2 blogs?

I don't think so.

Mine is at Live Journal under Carla_Fabritius.

But don't worry, I'm still here at hootoo plenty too.

I do like the luxury of being able to post photos.

H2g2 was seven years old last week. Someone started a celebration thread in Feedback: Community Soapbox and it got eight posts. Eight. http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/alabaster/F55683?thread=2841368

I saw that thread and would normally have 'been there' but I have to admit I haven't been feeling too thrilled about the way h2g2 is being run lately. The main thing keeping me here these days is all the lovely people I've met, but I suspect I'll be 'blogging' more as time goes on.


az

<>

I've started one here - it's not very long yet but I'll be adding people as I see them.

http://azahar.wordpress.com/


az

"but I have to admit I haven't been feeling too thrilled about the way h2g2 is being run lately."

It's interesting (and weird) having been outside for four months, looking in occasionally but not getting involved. I have to admit that amongst some very real RL things taking my attention, what's been happening here on h2 has also kept me at bay. I've had Jimster's unfortunate comments last year about the h2 'non-contributers' on my mind alot, and it's hard to watch the community change so much since then, when alot of that change has come from the bbc rather than the community.

Of course it might have always been like that I just noticed more from a distance.

On the upside, the EG projects seem to be going from strength to strength.


Something else that stood out as I come back is this thing that's always annoyed me but now really pisses me off. It's when there's an Issue on h2 and various threads will start up with everyone going why is this happening, but no-one actually emails the eds and then reports back with an answer. So there's this endless discussion with no-one actually knowing much, until an answer becomes obvious many LEDs down the track. When I had the time for taking part in such threads it was ok. Trying to follow an issue when I'm really limited in time and energy has been bloody annoying.

The most recent example of this was the campaign to get the Infinite Improbability Drive button back on the Front Page (a most worthwhile campaign). It didn't help to have an Italic turn up early on and post a humourous comment but no explanation

I've noticed this on the other online community I visit - that the admin people don't seem to recognise the value in letting people know what is going on. Although to be fair to TPTB they did give more warning about the swearing policy change than is usual.

Oh and I am *extremely glad I wasn't here when the swearing thing happened.

I believe it was about a week's notice, but since then no clear list of newly prohibited words. I've been discovering all sorts of new 'swear words' that I thought were just ordinary words before - after the filther blocks a post (without highlighting the offending word, so I have to guess).

Did you know that porn is now considered a swear word?

az

Oh, except it went through! I was told someone had their journal entry removed for writing the word porn in it the other day (even though they spelled it pron). It was then reinstated, so must have been an over-zealous yikeser.


az

I'm pleased to see bloody still gets through


Would it be asking for trouble if we compiled an A page with postable swear words?

A10606600

And if you email me I can send you something even better!


az

Profanisaurus. Brilliant.


I was thinking more of already known swearwords that get through the filter. It'd be handy to have a list so that individuals don't have to keep trying to find which work and which don't. Could be interpreted as flouting the intent of the new rules though.

You can still post shit and piss and bitch and prick, but not fríck - which is really weird because I didn't even know that fríck was a word, let alone a swear word, until I mistyped flick the other day and my post was blocked.


az

As for a list, it's been requested over and over again but apparently the eds prefer to keep us guessing. I mostly reckon it's because the list keeps changing daily whenever someone else complains about a word being 'offensive'.

az

"You can still post shit and piss and bitch and prick"



Great to see a splurge of real words


Yeah, it does seem weirdly arbitrary.