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

A rather selfish question perhaps for my first real post in a while! But a valid one methinks.

To begin with a thousand appologies to all those who's posts have gone unanswered for a while, but until this week I've had my workload trebbled (the trouble with trebble(s)?), and this week I needed my week off!

For a long time (Since August 2002 actually) I've asked myself what can I do for H2G2? However I have reached the limit of what I can realistically give, and am willing to give.

I know I've done a lot of... I won't say complaining as such, but perhaps moaning. I've probably made a few veiled threats to leave, and my journal's/posts probably haven't had the zest they once did for a while! I feel like I've lived off the first 18 months of my stay here! Perhaps not even that.

But I'm tired of looking for what I can do for h2g2. I need h2g2 to entice me back. I don't know what it needs to do, its got paid employees (nice people by the way, but they are paid) to do that. Or if it hasn't got employees thinking exactly that, then there is something seriously wrong.

I fear h2g2 is reaching out to a niche within a niche. People who have somehow been linked to the great Douglas Adams, Hitchhikers Guide to the galaxy...etc, or perhaps via the BBC's own website. But it seems like the throwing mud and seeing which sticks approach. Then you've got the meat and veg of the site - the Edited Guide. Which is another niche - people who've gone through the selection process mentioned above and then decided they wanted to write a guide which wasn't much like the guide of the books, but a kind of distorted version of the kind of thing Douglas Adams wanted. Unfortunately theres another site which has beaten it to it - Wikipedia, and seems to do it better.

I just think the Edited Guide takes itself far too seriously for its own good. I guess it has to, but it is so limited.

So why am I still here? Well I came here after following a link from the Hitchhikers TV show page on the BBC website. I'd read the hitchhikers Guide to the galaxy, and wanted to add something creative. But I strongly feel the creativity have been squeezed from this place, and I hate to say it but I don't think Douglas Adams would feel comfortable here. Though I'm sure he would be proud its still here. I'm still here because I feel some obligation to be here. But whatever debt I feel I have to pay is slowly losing its grip.

So why is this website here? I feel that it was originally here because of the wonderful motivation of the books. I feel it was meant to be a creative but an informative kind of guide to the world, and universe as we know it. And to an extent it is. But the energy feels sapped. I want to be proud of this place, I want to feel full of energy from seeing and using the site, but I feel drained whenever using it.

So what can be done to reverse it. Who can help me, and others like me? I know I'm not a lone, though I feel that I am perhaps one of the more vocal (though certainly not the most angry! I've read some angry leaving messages!). When someone goes they can't speak. So I guess I'm writing this as a message for whoever wants to read this and take it on board, so that maybe people might be able to help those who have perhaps put a lot in to the site, but have been left drained - and to a certain extent used.

We were the ones who kept the site together when others were trying to knock it down. The ones who got on with it, with little praise or patting on the back. And we're tired. There was never any praise for the groups that people start, little for the stories that people wrote, for the creative touches that made the guide gel and work.

It had felt like the more effort I've put in the less I've got back, which isn't good. So I ask, what can you do for me, h2g2? Because I've nothing more to give me until you can find an answer to that question. And it ain't 42.

How about the fact h2g2 let's you do these group things on a site that is supposed to be about writing guide entries?

And have discussions, actual discussions without the all mighty lock that other sites use when people go *cough* 'Off Topic' (which happens in conversations) on a site.

Ask not what h2g2 can do for you, ask what you can do for h2g2.

"I just think the Edited Guide takes itself far too seriously for its own good. I guess it has to, but it is so limited."

HEAR HEAR!!!! I'm glad I'm not the only dissenting voice

"But I strongly feel the creativity have been squeezed from this place"

As a fiction writer I feel like the illigitimate child, acknowledged but not mentioned in polite company.

Good'oh tinker, like the post and i feel somewhat the same way!


RJR

Yeah, I get what you're saying. Look at some of the earlier stuff and it's fun, quirky, informative but most of all enjoyable to read. Newer stuff ends up as "Ten Thousand Dry Facts About Cupboard Door Hinges". I mean, just contrast A583300 from 2001 with some of the more recent stuff. I know the point of the site isn't to mimic DNA's style, but it feels like the humour's being leeched from the Guide in a futile effort to compete with W*kipedia.

And h2g2 gives you those opinions ^^^^

And bandwidth

"How about the fact h2g2 let's you do these group things on a site that is supposed to be about writing guide entries?"

Funny I always thought it was about the community. They always *used* to make a big thing of that...

And if I don't want a lock I'll start up a board with friends...

I admit these are good things, but in a good website these are the extras. You need the heart to be working, before you work on the patients hair...

"Ask not what h2g2 can do for you, ask what you can do for h2g2."

Been there, done that, bought the rather expensive T-shirt... okay the last part was a slight lie... I'm not playing that game any more.

"And bandwidth"

As does any website. /WE'RE/ the customers!

"As a fiction writer I feel like the illigitimate child, acknowledged but not mentioned in polite company."

Sad but true. I'm not complaining for the sake of complaining. I genuinely think we're being ignored because we don't speak up!

"Good'oh tinker, like the post and i feel somewhat the same way!"

Thanks for the support

"Yeah, I get what you're saying. Look at some of the earlier stuff and it's fun, quirky, informative but most of all enjoyable to read. Newer stuff ends up as "Ten Thousand Dry Facts About Cupboard Door Hinges". I mean, just contrast A583300 from 2001 with some of the more recent stuff. I know the point of the site isn't to mimic DNA's style, but it feels like the humour's being leeched from the Guide in a futile effort to compete with W*kipedia."

Exactly! If we're not creative we have nothing.

That might seem a tad harsh, but they always say play to your strengths. We can't be trying to emulate Wikipedia for the sake of it. That would be like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy emulating the Encycolpedia Galactica... oh wait a minute...

I think people forget* that h2g2 has always been two things not one.

The first was article creation - the guide entries which can be submitted for peer review and are scouted for the edited guide.

This was the stated priciple objective of a site based on a guide to life, the universe and everything.

HOWEVER, the site encourages the forum threads and conversations which hang from very guide entry, edited or not, and thus the community of researchers discussing topics and making friends has grown. And it is vital to remind ourselves I think that community contains the edited guide AS WELL as guide entries which are more based around supporting community involvment and that includes everything from The Post to Ask h2g2.

I swiftly realised that my talents lay in this direction not the former. There have been researchers who have earnt a small piece of legend researching and writing x number of edited entries. My claim to fame on this site is to have invented, designed and maintained the Thingites. It may not mean mcuh in the grand scheme of the site but like it or loathe it, The Thingites have been a mainstay of community involvement - and I've lost count of the number of people who's first posts to this site have been "I want to join the thingites." I don't care for self aggrandisment and that is not my intention, rather what I'm trying to say is that even in my darker moments when I've thought WHY do I keep coming backhere after 6 years it is my investment and my place in the communtiy which continues to hold my interest. It has been quite a privilege to be the first port of call to many researchers and despite scaling back my involvement over the last few years I don't think I could ever walk away completly.

Terran and HPB, we all know each other from the storytime saga. I was the researcher who kept the only hard copy of the ask h2g2 forum which was locked and vanished for a long period of time in retroactive moderation when h2g2 was bought by the BBC. That is how I came at all to be involved in keep the thing going and it's only because myself and legion and you guys keep that interst that I stay on now.

So for me as a long standing user of the site I support the community side of the site and rarely write at all for the edited guide. I think if we get too dogmatic about thinking about what our roles and responsibilities are we've lost sight of why we are here. Wikipedia can go hang as far as I care.


*I was chastised by Whisky in the filter thread about having the cheek to mention somethixng that wasn't relevant to researchers writign gide entries.

I actually got a rather cheap looking h2g2 t-shirt for asking what I can do for h2g2. The nature of h2g2 is that it's always about input for its active users, not tangible rewards. It's a project. It's supposed to be a reward in and of itself.

And yes, contributing to the community counts as taking part in the project.

Believe it or not I have 2 h2g2 T-shirts, I was given one for making suggestions on how to improve h2g2 (Hum, I'm going to stay silent now) and I won one in the quiz at the Winter Meet

Clive I have a lot of respect for you and what you've done for h2g2. I also agree with pretty much everything you say.

Through your efforts you have probably welcomed more people to h2g2 than anybody. And it is only tragic that it has become something of a slightly thankless task. My groups, whilst when at their peak were full of lots of mostly excellent people (with the exception of certain unnamed, and probably no-longer on h2g2 people), are small in comparison to your efforts.

I don't think the people in charge are a) doing enough to help those running community groups, such as the post, such as the Thingites, the games that Greebo ran for ages before she disappeared. and b) enough to promote the creative side of h2g2 which is VITAL to the success of h2g2.

The Edited Guide entries are admittedly part of the community, but from my experience it is more part of the editorial process than any community building exercise. Forgive me if I'm wrong.

The priority HAS to be with the community, because if you develop a good friendly community then that feeds back in to the Edited Guide and much more besides.

I really enjoy our story writing sessions (even though I haven't added that much of late!), but again I think it is these projects that should be supported by the site.

And the comment from Whisky is a prime example of whats wrong with h2g2.

And you are spot on. If we get too dogmatic we have indeed lost sight of what were doing - and its just plain not fun anymore!

"The nature of h2g2 is that it's always about input for its active users, not tangible rewards. It's a project. It's supposed to be a reward in and of itself."

Jodan I hate to say it but I think you're wrong. The people on the Edited Guide side of things get rewards in having their work plastered on the front of the site. They are fully supported by the team behind the project, and the scouts are probably the most active group of all - their conduct I have heard varying reports about...

Suffice to say I don't think that the community has been as supported as it should have been!

"Believe it or not I have 2 h2g2 T-shirts, I was given one for making suggestions on how to improve h2g2 (Hum, I'm going to stay silent now) and I won one in the quiz at the Winter Meet"

You were *given* a T-Shirt?