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

When in doubt ask a pedant! How does this friends stuff work? Is it done to claim anyone as a friend without asking? Or are people just adding all familiar names? This place has made me nervous and I'm anxious not to offend. I'm just the same in real life. Snigger. Gwen

Hey, Gwen! I just finished posting this explaination elsewhere...

Basically, you are free to add as many or few people to your "Friends list" without asking them. Everybody you list becomes "monitored" on your behalf, and whenever they post on-site you're informed, with a link to the post being added to the "My Conversations" list on your Personal Space.

It's handy to be able to spot when an irregular visitor has popped in to the site, but if the person becomes so prolific a poster that the list of their contributions pushes all your conversations off your own conversation list, they you can freely remove them.

As I say, you don't need to ask permission to add / remove people but some folk like to ask anyway, out of a sense of politeness; it isn't considered impolite not to ask, though. Hope that helps...

Thanks for that! I have now boldly added your name to my list. Gwen

Ooooh, you're gonna regret that...

I post a lot of nonesense in some very obscure places, and now you'll be informed every time I do.

thanks for asking this question. By some miracle I found it before asking the same thing..

pj.

ps how DOES one add to ones friends list? (and how does indicate the emphasis of one's sentence without cyber shouting?_

Hiya, pj.

To add someone as a friend, go to their Personal Space and click on "Add to friends". (In pale blue on white, at the top-right of the screen if you use the default Brunel skin)

Sadly, text emphasis doesn't work in h2g2 threads, but as I posted elsewhere we've been promised that it'll be added to Mustardland soon after the changeover. Just now, we tend to emphasize with smileys.