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

Trouble is, the bloggers who run events and so on get out of it. Links, hits, moving up the rankings.

Well, we should certainly show stats. Personally I think we should show them on every page, the way the hitcounters show stats on YouTube.

Links - yeah, why not.

Rankings? - Again, why not? Though that's a separate discussion. What rankings? How would people move up and down them? But yeah. In a eat world out there, who wants to be a ? Er...

Personally, I envisaged a lot of the stuff being run through the Post. Perhaps I'll wait to tell Bel her new responsibilities though.

This comment is about researcher retention, but I can't find the relevant thread so I am sticking it here before I forget about it. There was much moaning going on about the lack of a refreshing conversations window in Barlesque, me included. I still desperately want that, but that function is really only useful for those of us that log in on a regular basis.

We also need the option to be to be notified via email when an update is made to an entry or thread to which one is subscribed.

I'm still all for badgers. 'This Entry was rated with 5 out of 10 badgers'

"Your h2g2 ranking is 750 badgers. Well done!"

WM, I got the refreshing conversations covered up in Site Structure already.

A problem that I can see with these ratings is that it could get too much like the Eurovision or TV talent shows. Not the best 'wins' but the most popular or whatever. So people with more friends in h2g2 would get higher ratings.
And then readers would see the ratings and think just because an Entry didn't get many votes it is bad although the writer just wasn't so popular.
There's also the problem that some topics are just more popular on h2g2 than others so they get more readers and would get more votes than Entries about less popular topics although they may be just as good.

I'm all for badgers too

The E-mail notification would be extremely useful; particulalry where you could on an entry, request E-mail alert for when someone posts to that entry... Most forums seem to have something very simular, and I guess we could have a simular E-mail notification for when there's been a post to a thread, though personally I'd not use that much, or at all

I'd like to see a greater ability, err, or any in fact, to engage the rest of the web from within HooToo, and visa versa; including facebook, and twitter, but also as I think mentioned earlier in this thread, with blogs and such like. Having some kind of open ID would be very good; I long ago suggested... BoB-knows where that it'd be good were people able to comment Etc., on an entry even if they weren't a researcher... they could then hit the 'Email me if there's a reply to this', and albeit, that at teh moment they first post a comment there, they're not registered, were they over time to find replys to their comment, begin to see a bit of what the site is like, then I think maybe not all, but a proportion of those not registered, posters, would graduate to join, and unlike people joining who've not really had any contact with the site prior to joinging, I think they'd naturally end up having a higher retention rate.

In terms of advertising, I think it'd be great were we able to attract back students, as I think its one group, since about 2002 or 2003 that just seemed to vanish, and I'm not entirely sure now why... I imagine it was facebook, then twitter, bloggin etc., that just became so commonplace as to render their looking elsewhere on the web less likely No clue really about how to change that... Maybe some physical advertising in student magazines, which wouldn't even cost if it was written as some kind of article, as the're useuallly so desperate to find anyone willing to write content for them (well that used to be the case when I were a student)...

Ok, I finally ask the question: what exactly is open ID? Does it mean that when I sign up to h2g2 numerous other pages will get my name, address, email etc?

Ooh no,

Open ID is a system where you can leave a comment on various websites with one ID. So you can leave a comment without needing to create new passwords for each site:

http://openid.net/get-an-openid/what-is-openid/

If we did implement Open ID then you could still sign up to h2g2 and it would still be the same, but if you were reading and just wanted to leave a comment you could do that without creating a new account, just with using the open iD account that you already have.

aaaah, thanks

Seems like a good idea, I just hope that it wouldn't result in more moderation issues.

Maybe, as I think I've said before somewhere, if OpenID were used, posts made with it could be on premod, with this made clear to the poster, and the message on the post saying that it was made by someone not registered--just to make it clear that that particular post wasn't yikesed or anything. Those posts could be given highest priority with the moderators (and then an email sent when the post goes live). If the post *does* break rules, then treat it like any other yikesed post--maybe have a more detailed "what rules this broke" email, though.

Certainly a good idea,

Though on most blogs people leave comments and they appear instantly so they would be expecting that to happen on h2g2 as well.

It would depend on the number of moderators we had as wel, whether or not it's workable.

>> Though on most blogs people leave comments and they appear instantly so they would be expecting that to happen on h2g2 as well.

I would say that was some blogs, not most. Though some take you off pre-mod if your first post was ok.

I agree with <> As in the thread about "How do you solve a problem" last year http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/F83586?thread=7099723&post=91499746#p91499746 My idea was <> The numbers have changed a bit but the idea is the same. I thought of that idea because at the time there was no chance of any money for upgrades, there are probably better ways. I do think this is important because edited entries are pretty much abandoned once in the Guide which is sad and lots of useful conversations go on in askh2g2 but are then lost to the Guide which is also sad. If those conversations could be linked to relevant entries in some way, people could help build the guide just by talking. If at a later time there was an update of an edited article, there would be the chance to take the information posted over the years not just hoping some researchers who know about the topic show up in Peer Review to help in the weeks the article goes through Peer Review.

That's quite similar to the list of most recent comments on Entries that has been suggested for the Front Page.

Welcome Brownfurby and thanks for commenting! Nothing new under the sun, eh? I like your version though. Could be a list on personal spaces though too. At the moment we have 'my convos' and 'message centre'. We could also have the dummy subscriber's list as well. Or a button, like the one that takes you to 'peer review'.

Or, everybody could be automatically subscribed to any new convos on new entries (I think we'd have to limit it to that, or it would, perhaps be too irritating). The they have to unsubscribe rather than go searching, if you see what I mean. Bit invasive though. Probably too far.

Incidently, I'm not sold on some of my suggestions. The comments thing I do think needs a good think about, but the rankings thing is just an example. I'm not overly keen on it. Feel free to criticise!

I'll agree to almost anything if you stroke my ego enough.

There was a time, about five years ago, when some of our highest-posting researchers found out that there was a ranked list of the ones with the greatest number of posts. This created a great deal of excitement. I don't know if these ranked lists get made any more, or even if it's a worthy use of computer power, but there is clearly an incentive at work. We've also seen, a bit more recently, that every time a researcher hit the 100 mark with edited fuide articles, that researcher would be featured on the Front Page and celebrated in the Post. Again, it must have been very nice to have one's ego stroked. They deserved all the acclaim they received.