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

Entry ID: A26107751 (Edited)



[ ] Links to a BBC News Page dated 7 June, 2004. However, on 23rd August, 2008, an even larger prime number was discovered, comprising nearly 13 million digits! http://primes.utm.edu/largest.html

As we will continue to discover record-breaking primes (and don't ask me why), maybe it would be better to quote anything as an example (eg the one already there), but go on to say that longer ones are being discovered regularly.

Three years have passed since the latest find, so I think there are likely to be substantial intervals between discoveries, don't you? Anyway, it will be newsworthy enough for one of us to notice, when it happens.

Also, the one found in 2008 is some 30% longer than the previous record... and it's not too hard to update an Entry.

We should at least try to be as up to date as possible.

In an ideal world I'd agree with you. Sadly, there are too many outdated entries in the EG which aren't being picked up because the author has elvised and nobody else bothered subscribing to read the comments. I'd like a future h2g2 to be a little bit cleverer in this respect.

I have a couple of entries which need a lot of housekeeping - Millennium Construction Boom is one, Famour Air Crash Victims, too. I try to read them every year or so and keep them updated, but I forget for long periods (that reminds me - I never did write that Steve Fossett update)

"Sadly, there are too many outdated entries in the EG"

That's hardly a good reason not to update this one though, is it?

The fact that so many entries need attention - including newly sub-edited ones - caused me, a while back, to give up contributing to Editorial Feedback... and to disappoint my fan club to boot.

This business of authorship rights preventing the updating of entries seems to be an insuperable hurdle.

Yes, you're quite right.

It's a wonderful repository of articles we have here, and our processes (like updating for example) haven't really developed as the library has increased. We're constrained a bit by resources, of course. Not just the permanent team, but by the availability of volunteers/contributors - we never *expect* anyone's commitment.

I'll have to leave it there for now, Icy.

Off to see if Nadal can end Djokovic's run.

>>This business of authorship rights preventing the updating of entries seems to be an insuperable hurdle.

What does that mean? Author donate their entries to the site and they can be updated later without any reference to the author. It helps if the author is around, though, because they understand the topic better than anybody.

There are many superb entries in the guide, but there are plenty of lousy ones too. Are you saying that we can axe the trash without the authors' permission?

We're allowed to 'improve' the originals. In some cases this has involved removing virtually everything in the original. We leave the original author's credit, though, as he or she deserves the credit for writing the thing in the first place, even if none of their content remains.

Ah, the Trigger's Broom paradox

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ship_of_Theseus

I wrote a new article on Galileo, as the original was atrocious (and wrong). I used none of the original material and their article no longer exists. So no, we don't need an author's permission to replace a pile of tripe.

GB

I don't think it says anywhere that a published entry shall remain in the guide in perpetuity, does it? Obviously if an author was still around, we'd be in a better position to negotiate a peaceful settlement with them.