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

After a bit of discussion, we discovered that h2g2 was no longer showing up in Google searches because somebody in their wisdom had set the pages so that Google wouldn't index them, because search engines were slowing the site down.

This resulted in not a lot of people knowing that h2g2 exists. Google is after all the number 1 search engine.

Woodpigeon contacted Jim Lynn, and we suggested that the Edited Guide should be indexed, even if the rest wasn't. I suggested a mechanism by which this could be done.

It worked!

Now h2g2 comes up first in many Google searches, and is always somewhere on the list, even if it is buried deep. Try the following for example:

irish neolithic tombs
storegga tsunamis
dominatrix dog

And its Friday too!

dominatrix dog - that was on Iggy Pop's last album, wasn't it?

Searching for

how to make a perfect cup of tea

returns in 4th place, Douglas Adams's only Edited Guide Entry.

At the third attempt with my own entries, I landed at No. 1 with "amateur lumberjacking".

Fame at last!!!

"good coffee" gives A592832 in second place
"monivea galway ireland" gives A505603 in third place
"western alphabet" gives A2451890 in 1st place

You are not wrong

I tried 'Soma cube' and got links to two EG entries on the first page. Not every search is as successful, but I had fun trying to find the newly searchable entries eg snow lantern, canoe liberty, ohio sloopy, plastic bag bra etc.

Pimms

... all of which just goes to show what a treasure trove of information hootoo has become.

Let's hope this will encourage lots of new readers, and a few new writers too!

Lets hope so; none of mine are above the third page in the pecking order though

Whoah! "Bussard ramjet" and my entry is SECOND. Cool!

H.

'Billy Joel Fire' is also fourth.

B

Strange - my first-ever entry on Harringay is top of the list, yet my one on the relatively obscure subject of Just Fontaine is a no-show...

Oranges and lemons - top hit! So some good did come from the conversation after all.

Some of my other entries I didn't even make the first page, but hopefully as they do get found, more will get linked to and they will move up the list.

Wow. Rainbows End is a long shot, but we turn up on the second page of googlepicks.

Well done Gnomon

I have a feeling I first came across hootoo via google 2½ years ago, but I can't remember the topic.

Now we'll have to have a serious look at filling all the gaps.

Traveller in Time on his head
"I just hope the service failures last Thing had nothing to do with it."

Jim Lynn says that it had nothing to do with it.

My Just Fontaine EG entry (A1108829) seems to be invisible Not only does it not show up on google, but I can't seem to find it on an h2g2 search either.

I put "Just Fontaine" + h2g2 into Google, hit the 'show omitted results' link, and it's the first two hits.

B