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

You know, if you wanted to become an official ACE, the Eds (and the rest of us!) would be happy to have you.
You may be new but you've thrown yourself into the place with abandon and, as a new person, you're a bit more in touch than us .

If you want to stick to being unofficial that's just fine too. I just thought I'd mention it.

Hi Vip. I guess you're talking about my burst of unofficial meet-and-greet the other night. I'm ashamed to saythat that was moreinfluenced than anything. Seemed like a good idea at the time. Actually, I still think it's a good idea, but it needs a bit more forethought.
I'm honoured to be considered ACE material, though I'd say "not yet". I'm not sure that I'd have the commitment. But I'll certainly bear it in mind.
You've also boosted my ego quite a bit with the suggestion that I might be young and in touch!

I've been here eight years, and I sometimes forget that not only is h2g2 tricky to navigate for a newbie, but that it's a lot bigger than when I joined. Someone a little newer remembers such things with a lot more clarity!

ACEing actually isn't that time consuming. Once you've written your 'standard' message, it's a copy and paste job off of a list, occasionally altering the message if the new person in question has actually posted something or changed their Space. That's pretty rare these days as everyone who joins a BBC board gets an h2g2 Space, regardless of whether they're here, at 606, Radio 4 or whatever. Mine's at A62516603 if you want to have a look - all comments are welcome. I added your Who's Online suggestion only this morning, and Emmily posted some suggestions about half an hour ago on my Space, so it seems to be under scrutiny at the moment!

Just one thing - if you do feel like unofficially welcoming, please don't do so to anyone who hasn't already had a message from an ACE. If you post a message to their Space it'll take them off our welcoming list - then we'll miss them completely.

I try to follow them in conversations and post to let them know that someone is out there, reading what they write. A lot of people join up to post to an article that was on the Front Page years ago and the aroginal authour has left the building. Very few come back, but I had one only today who came back after several weeks to respond to a reply I left. I can only hope that I've piqued her interest and she'll stick around.

Woah, that was a long post. Sorry. Getting new people to the site and getting them to stick around is something that I'm very interested in - there was 14 of us online at 8am this morning. 14! That was how many used to be online, at night, in 2002. There's only 35 now (12 noon) - I remember when we used to regularly have over 100 people logged on around this time.

h2g2 is dying, and I don't want that to happen. Possibly I take this too seriously...

Navigation is h2g2's biggest problem I think. Obviously there are going to be a fair percentage of people who just don't like what's on offer, even if they could find their way around, and that's fair enough. But it seems perverse to lose people who might stay simply because there appears to be nothing happening at first (and 2nd, 3rd and 4th) glance.
I've found stuff because I'm a persistent bugler who relishes a challenge. A lot will have neither the time nor the inclination. (I found a map of the place once).
Identifying problems is easy though. A solution? I don't know. The only sure fire way I can think of is to sit next to someone and show them which buttons to press. The logistics will be a nightmare.

Thanks for the warning about knocking people off your welcoming list. I didn't know it worked like that, and I'll tread carefully in future.
I'm not sure that h2g2 is actually dying. There's not many people about, but those that are...oh my lord...
The only way that it will end is if the BBC kill it. And because of the pioneering nature of the site (yes, over a decade ago, but..), and the fact of Douglas Adams, I think that trying to kill it could open up a world of hurt (pardon me for going all Hollywood. You know what I mean).
I think that the simple fact that it's still here today is a really good sign that it will continue.

But I'm the person who said that video recorders would never catch on.

Video recorders didn't stay though...

I guess those of us here are pretty stuck. It's a way of life as much as anything else (speaking of, how close are you to Bristol?).

If we get this long (and I mean LONG) awaited rebrand, I think we're safe for another five years. If they decide not to, I think that's where it'll fail. We'd have to either buy the site from the BBC (somehow), pick it up when the BBC drops it officially (although I reckon they'll just run it into the ground) or resign ourselves to Wikipedia.

You're right; we are still here.

>how close are you to Bristol?<

Mid-Cheshire. Which might as well be the other side of the world given the current state of my finances
Just realised that, as my ACE, I'm supposed to ask you questions, so:

1) Is there any way to bookmark a conversation?

2) What are these digiboxes that I keep seeing mentioned?

1. You can only use the bookmarks function in Brunel, and it only bookmarks pages (though not Peer Review, annoyingly). I don't *think* it can do conversations, but I suggest asking a Guru - TRiG is someone I reckon would know.

2. Digiboxes are a way of accessing limited internet through your television (they also provide extra channels, a bit like a freeview box, I think). They weren't supposed to be able to access chat forums and the like, but as h2g2 is part of the BBC it was a back door onto here.

The digibox caused quite a stir; the majority refused to use proper English as their TV-based keyboard was slow and clunky. They used txt-speak all the time, and there was also a large batch of people that refused to integrate. There were a few great people, of course, who stayed and are still here (but through a PC these days). I think there are a couple of people (well, I know one) who still somehow access h2g2 through the digibox.

In the end, an h2g2 user wrote to the cable company to tell them about the loophole, which was then closed. The act of doing this upset a lot of people, even including those who didn't like the digibox users, because they felt it was underhand. It caused a lot of upset at the time and a few users left for good over the bad feeling.

Finances - bugger. Worse luck. When thet are better, we'll organise a meet up closer to you.

Thanks Vip. Didn't realise it was only us hip Brunel users that had a bookmark function. It really is incredibly useful you know. I'm pretty sure it won't do conversations, but that would also be a useful thing.

The digibox story is a great bit of history. There was a thread a while back trying to collect bits of h2g2 history. If only I could have bookmarked it...

Hopefully the new skin will have all sorts of functionality. I use Plain, which was broken when it was first released (not that they told anyone about it) and is still broken now. I just can't abide too much colour on my pages (although I love Goo).

h2g2 has history. And you're right that we should try and write it down. Perhaps there should be a collaborative UnderGuide Entry or something...
Then again, I think a lot of us would rather forget some of the... uh... less happy times. The digibox thing really did upset a lot of people.

I suddenly felt like I hadn't appreciated you enough recently. I have no idea why.

Please accept a smiley tableau of me running over, hugging you for about three seconds, and running off again.

Vip! As it happens, I learnt yesterday that I had failed to get a job that I had applied for. Not a disaster, but I was looking forward to it, and in my own arrogant way assumed that because I had applied, it must naturally be mine. So I was suffering the stings of rejection when, out of nowhere, you ran up to me and gave me a virtual three second hug. And that really cheered me up. So, big from me and (just in case). Oh, and happy ninth birthday (bit late).

What a happy coincidence!

Commiserations on the job, by the way. It's always a downer to hear things like that. Keep trying, there will be something out there.

What's your trade?

Fortunately, it wasn't a move that I had to make, I just fancied it. What is my trade? Organising I suppose (not people, I'm rubbish at that). Show me a complex process, shut me in a room for a bit, and I'll make it run smoother. Planning, logistics, production control, I have a knack for finding a slightly better way of doing something. Or (and this is something that is hard to learn), admitting that the current system is just fine. Leave it be.

I'm also good at packing lots of stuff in cupboards. I'd actually be a lot happier just doing that for a living.

You sound a lot like Mr Vip - Six Sigma black belt at work and the the only person I can think of who can get all our camping gear loaded into one car.

I've just seen you post again. How's tricks?

*poke*

I was just wondering... could I tempt to to apply for an ACE-ship? We're not desperate or anything, but we are about to start creating a list of all the people who are interested in being ACEs in the new exciting future.

No pressure, just thought I'd mention it in case you felt like it.

Hi Vip. Oh, and hello to Vip in February as well. Sorry, I must have missed that one. I don't think I've got enough commitment to be an ACE to be honest. I visit the site pretty regularly, largely in a lurking capacity, catching up on conversations, marvelling at the ability of some people to repeat themselves in slightly different words for several hundred posts... I am looking forward to the change though. Not quite sure why, because if everything goes well there won't actually be much of a change will there? At least not from the average user's point of view. I foresee a huge outbreak of Is-This-Itness.

But anyway, how are you? How's the little Viplet doing?

Hey, no worries.

The little Viplet (I like that!) is doing as fine as can be expected at this point. The 20-week abnormality scan came out all clear and he's kicking me at regular, if infrequest intervals.

I hope you're right about the Change? What Change? feeling. There's lots of change for those of us involved in getting it sorted out, but for your average user it shouldn't make a whole lot of difference (except the moderators have a better idea of what makes the site tick).

Mind you, hopefully in a year or so we'll start seeing some innovation in the site in terms of how it works, catching up with the rest of the internet and so on. But certainly not straight away!

I was just reading your Space and thinking that, y'know, if you wanted to change your name now would be the perfect time to do it. There's a lot of it going around.