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

I've been known to believe some silly things. I believed in the UnderGuide, which has succeeded spectacularly where so many other inventions failed. I've believed in h2g2, even when I've been away from it, and the strength of its community since I joined this site about five years ago. And now, I believe in our Edited Guide, and I believe that there is nothing to stop h2g2 from defeating the creeping malaise and the proliferation of flat, unstimulating entries.

This journal is not an effort to convince people in my vision, which has been fairly well belabored and unsubscribed from elsewhere. It is a call to action. If you have an inkling that the direction of the Edited Guide is wrong, if you've ever felt excluded by a certain set of standards in the Edited Guide, if you've ever been too intimidated to confront the less logical aspects of Peer Review and its process, if you feel that h2g2 has to be its own site, then I am calling for you to take arms and make a difference.

Make a journal entry explaining your frustrations. Write an entry that you feel typifies what the Guide should be accepting, and submit it to Peer Review. Post in the EGWW and Peer Review, and challenge the hell out of the assumptions that form the status quo. Start a conversation with a friend or in an open forum about the future of the Edited Guide. Write something for . Read A4053412 PROD, which was the beginning of a discussion about the Edited Guide's future about a year and a half ago. Ask yourself if you want someone linking to these conversations a year and a half in the future, with nothing having changed. Be vigorous, polite and reasoned.

As a name for a vision, I think that 'Open Guide' neatly sums up what I feel needs to change, and I have some specific ideas that I will argue for. However, because of the very nature of this 'open' movement attitude, we will have different ideas, and I look forward to embracing and debating your own visions and beliefs. The unfortunate tendency of a 'closed' guide is that some of the most thoughtful and open-minded people tend to be shoved aside, and are used to being wallflowers and observers of the EG. It is these people who are needed most. It is time to come forward. While I do not believe the strength of our numbers will change things, I do believe that the strength of ideas will.

-Jordan

Admirable sentiments, Jodan, to which I give my wholehearted support

I would like to echo those sentiments and offer my wholehearted support also

A little less conversation, a little more action, fellas. Just to be perfectly clear, I'm not looking for support, I'm looking for anyone who happens across this thread to take some action.

Already working on something now

I bought a 500-page A5-size book after your last journal, J, to research an Entry I've been planning for a while. No other reason. Action enough?

I fail to understand this constant clamour, from the same minority it seems, to change the format of the Edited Guide.
There is more than enough scope for writing of all types on H2G2, from fact to fiction, from poetry to limericks, so why change the EG itself?
Name another site that publish's anything near what get's published here, in the same format, with the same community run/based site?
I liken this call for change to people who go and buy a brand new house and a week after moving in have builders in knocking walls down and redesigning the whole layout. Why buy the house in the first place if it's not what you want?. The same analogy applies here, if you don't like the EG or the guidelines then why join the site in the first place? Go elsewhere or start your own guide site in the style and format you like.

ST.

Hello

I don't really intend for this thread to become a debate thread. I already have enough of those right now. Normally, I'm content to allow threads to develop as they wish, but since this is in my journal, I feel comfortable in making that request. I'll make a response post on your personal space, and additionally, feel free to discuss this with me in the thread below this one in my journal, the 'Soul of the Guide' thread.

My apologies, I wasn't intending to start a debate as such, just expressing an opinion.


ST.

No problem I've dropped you a line on your space, and I hope we can continue the discussion there.

My friends will tell you that I'm incapable of allowing an opinion I disagree with from devolving into a debate, or argument. It's one of the many problems I have.

F96950?thread=4800525 Terran
F40352?thread=4799116 Waz
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F76049?thread=4800558 Pin

I support this wholeheartedly, but am far from erudite enough to write something in my own journal to that effect.

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Why are you linking to my space? I suggest you look again at my reply and then you can remove this link.


ST.

I linked because I thought you would like your point got across and because I wanted to hear other peoples thoughts on it.

Well, frankly no link needed, I've replied, and like I said there, I may not stay subbed but I do bookmark threads I post to. I'm entitled, as you rightly point out, to express my views and opinions, that doesn't mean I then have to continue the same argument in half a dozen threads on the same topic. Thats why I made the point that this type discussion/debate should be done as a talking point where everyone can say there piece in one place and we don't get what we now have, repetition of the same old arguments, worded slightly differently in half a dozen journals with the negative impact they cause.

ST

I'm sorry but I still fail to see how you see the talking about the guide, that is going on in communities (as it does in real life), is a negative thing. Anyway, I'll cease my talking on this particular thread because I know Jodan didn't want discussions to take place on this thread.

"Well, frankly no link needed, I've replied, and like I said there, I may not stay subbed but I do bookmark threads I post to. I'm entitled, as you rightly point out, to express my views and opinions, that doesn't mean I then have to continue the same argument in half a dozen threads on the same topic. Thats why I made the point that this type discussion/debate should be done as a talking point where everyone can say there piece in one place and we don't get what we now have, repetition of the same old arguments, worded slightly differently in half a dozen journals with the negative impact they cause."

That's just ridiculous. You can't tell people to stop voicing their opinions because you believe that they will cause a negative impact, especially when you have absolutely no supporting evidence in that conclusion. That's some kind of awkward censorship that is not the kind of thing that h2g2 is about. You also can't defend your right to express your views' while telling other people to not express theirs because you don't agree with them.

I have a bit of experience with h2g2. These introspective debates do nothing to harm the site. It's important that we evaluate our place in the internet and consider these things. You can disagree, but do not try to shut anyone up. Now, please remove this thread from your bookmarks, unsubscribe, whatever you have to do, and don't come back. I am not trying to shut you up - you're free to shout your views from the rooftops - but this is my journal, and you're just frankly very boring to listen to.