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

Are we allowed to ask what they were?

<./>RandomEditedEntry</.>

'Carmina Burana' - Drink, Sex and Medieval Monks

Informative and very readable. Peters out at the end, which is a shame. 4/5


Mountain Biking

Very old entry with jokes I didn't understand. It would benefit from a rewrite for the modern age. 2/5


Ottawa International Airport, Ontario, Canada

It does its job. I doubt you could really make an entry about an airport that exciting. Needs an update 3/5


Snowdrops

Comprehensive and authoritative. 4/5


Chris de Burgh - Singer/Songwriter

The essentials are there, but it's a bit listy. 3/5

Theatre Stage Machinery - A1304821

Veers wildly between very interesting and well written, to the dull minutae of safe working loads for various bits of equipment. 3/5

On Being an Artist's Model - A593138

Needs. More. Subheadings. It's a style thing, but lots of entries come across as a wall of text above the fold. This is a cracking article, but it's just formatted in such a way that makes it difficult for skim-reading.

And if it's difficult to skim, people won't read it all. That's how the web works. Luckily, once you scroll down, it's far more forgiving. 3/5

Grey Owl - Early Environmentalist - A53811777

Brilliant article, comprehensive, and very well-written. Really gives a sense of the man. 5/5

Fax Machines - A137648

From 1999. Tries to be funny and isn't. Woefully outdated. Gets a point for suggesting that email is a better bet. 1/5


Amelia Earhart - Death by Parallax? - A3694854

The only article where the footnotes are longer than the body text. It's a good piece though. Takes a dry subject and slaps a human face on it. All our science articles can learn from this. 4/5

16/25

http://h2g2.com/dna/h2g2/brunel/A533954 - Bacillus 2-9-3 - fascinating subject. I'd have liked just a little more. 3/5


Rosemary's Baby - the Film A16442868 - Not really my kind of thing. Basically a cast list followed by a plot summary. I couldn't find the interest to read it, so 2/5.

A156520 - Pop Music - as 1999 entries go, this is better than many, but it might be nice to have an entry about pop music which is a) a little more informative and b) a little less contemptuous. Not that you have to love pop, but all the digs in the entry are obvious ones. 2/5

A1913401 - Taxis in Bangkok - at the heart of this there is some useful information, but it's dragged down a bit by the same pat statements made about taxis in any foreign city. 2/5

A126596 - Campanology - The Art Of Bell-ringing. The pick of today's bunch. This one's from 1999, but I suspect it's had a thorough overhaul more recently. Knowledgable, readable, interesting and contains plenty of information. 4/5

"A126596 - Campanology - The Art Of Bell-ringing. The pick of today's bunch. This one's from 1999, but I suspect it's had a thorough overhaul more recently. Knowledgable, readable, interesting and contains plenty of information. 4/5"

Thank goodness, someone enjoyed it!

And I don't even have any particular interest in bell-ringing, so it's more of a compliment. But that's the kind of thing an Entry should do. I would never have sat down and Googled "campanology". But when I started reading it I was thinking "Yeah - that's pretty interesting!"

Thank you for pointing me to Icy North's A53811777
5 outa 5 indeed!
An excellent entry.


~jwf~

This evenings 5

i) Swamp Soccer - A126596

From 2003, I'd never even heard of this sport, but h2g2 documented this sport three years before the game was first played in the UK.

Interest - 4/5

I am tempted to contact the UK Swamp Soccer website and ask them permission to use one of their photos of a game being played.

ii) Privet Hawk Moth A272657

Disappointing. Needs updating. 1/5

iii) John Titor: a Time Traveller From The Year 2036? A6345407

One of our Entries that figures highly - people seem to search for information on this possible scam. Or was it? Not really my cup of tea, but judging by the amount of readers it gets, other people seem to find it interesting.

iv) The Julio-Claudian Emperors - A3625904

in fact it was the Nero entry out of this University project.

Seriously written factual stuff. If I'd needed to answer some homework questions, or find answers to a general knowledge quiz, this would be on the button. As something to read purely to pass the time, this didn't really hook me. It was like reading someone else's school essay. Nothing wrong with it, but it lacked fire. 3/5

v) The Chimps' Tea Party A47905743

If I mention that Icy wrote this one, that's all I need to say, but I'll say more anyway.

A seriously insightful piece of writing, marking an important change in the culture and ethos of zoos. The reader is drawn in, given anecdotes and facts. Writers - take note of how Icy does it. 5/5

I notice a guide entry on bell ringing has appeared in the h2g2 editors twitter feed.

>> Writers - take note of how Icy does it. 5/5 <<

It is becoming more and more apparent innit.

~jwf~

@ Benjamin - I fully admit to finding this thread very useful in pointing me to Entries that I can promote. It's very helpful to read other people's views rather than rely entirely on my own reactions.

I try to balance new Entries with ones from the archives, sometimes we have a date (eg May the Fourth) that we can link relevant Entries to. But it still means I spend a lot of time reading *lots* of Entries. So, please keep your discoveries coming. Even if you don't find gems, your response to these random entries is very valuable information for curating purposes.

My random Entries today only got as far as The Forth Road Bridge. A1062541

Excuse the pun, but I found this very pedestrian prose. It lacks an image even..... Now who do we know who lives near this iconic bridge?

* note to self, write a new introductory sentence at the very minimum, give the search engines at least a sporting chance to find this Entry.*

The perfect pot noodle - A1091486 - well other than perfect meaning it should not be opened, this was quite a good, vaguely humourous entry - though it would benefit from a piccy 3/5

John Kettley - A4008638 - yawn, well written, and with a pic, but very far out my interest 3/5

How to Tell if you're a democrat or a Republican - A4538793 - I've read it before, an excellent (picced) entry, with an interesting historical background before it gets down to it - 5/5

Average 3.67

Lazanbaby: sorry, just to be clear, I was sort of vaguely teasing, I wasn't in any sense being unkind. Or at least, I wasn't trying to be.

Oh I didn't think for a moment that you had any hidden agenda Benjamin - in fact I was quite glad you'd spotted the link between this thread and the twitter/facebook feed.

Jolly good. Otherwise I might have had to develop a hidden agenda, and I don't think i have time for that.

And I should mention that if anyone comes across an Entry, such as the Pot Noodle one, that lacks a photograph that would be easy enough to produce - please do send it to the Artists who are delighted when this happens.

Not that anyone here eats Pot Noodle of course. That would be asking too much in the line of duty.

Would a hypothetical person who sent in a hypothetical photo of a hypothetical Pot Noodle have a guarantee of anonymity for the good of their reputation?

The guide eds are legally obliged to report such occurrences. I believe you have to to go on sort of register.

dear lord that was a confusing six posts to come back to after a good night's drinking

Which answers the experiment "can nbb understand h2g2 after six hours in the pub " - of course for a valid control I'd have to be able to understand h2g2 normally...which I'm none too sure about