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

Hey, Jodan, I appreciate this.

But don't bump the scout-thing. Let's see if someone else finds it.

Pin

They might just not know what to say to you.

Don't worry to much, okay? The UG Eds are a capable bunch, and what we can't do with diplomacy I can accomplish with kicking and screaming until I start crying. Waz and Ben are on the case. If that's not a reassurance, I don't know what is.

Hey Jodan
Long time, no wotsit.
And have a Happy New Year, btw.
Now, I just discovered that Ambrose Bierce was an Ohioan. Your copious annals are surely therefore missing someone important.
Any interest in a joint Entry?

Am I so associated with my state around here that any time y'all hear something about Ohio, you seek my counsel? I remember that as soon as she heard about the big blackout a year or so ago that affected much of Ohio, boots went to my page.

Didn't know he was an Ohioan. Any time I've seen a list of people coming from Ohio, his name never popped out. Halle Berry, Steven Spielberg and a great many turn-of-the-19th-century presidents but not Bierce.
I'm afraid I don't know enough about the fellow to be of any value in an entry other than spouting out facts I see on a website.

OK, try it this way...
I wasn't seeking your counsel. I just quite liked the idea of writing something together. This one seemed a worthy and appropriate topic.

I was introduced to the (utterly brilliant) Devil's Dictionary more than twenty years ago, by a friend whose American girlfriend produced it as a retort to the assertion that American's couldn't do satire. I knew that Bierce was a contemporary and rival of Twain, but I'd presumed that he was a Californian, being editor of the SF-something-or-other.

What I didn't know till earlier this week is that we went West late, and before that he'd had a fairly harrowing military career. He fought at Shiloh and Chickamauga. I've also learned that he ended his life intriguingly : he set off to observe the Mexican revolution of 1913 and just disappeared.

There seem to be lots of other edgy traits and contradictions too - like the fact that his writing suggests misogyny whereas he was a incorrigible ladies' man. He seems to have had a fearlessness that bordered on self-destruction. In short, he's suddenly turned into the kind of person I like to research and write about.

If you're not so inclined, and if you don't mind, I'll do one on him myself and so create a little bit of Ohio that will be forever someone-other-than-Jodan.

Pin

Wo, Jodes

Glad your computer's still running, anyhow.
(Glances at Entry above - something else not got round to, like the Archiving)

I read your 'outcome'. If that's what we want, why not just throw it into the ImprovePR thread?

Pin (far from sure that's *all* we want, btw)

Damn conversations list...
I saw there were two new posts on it, and I wondered if you had second thoughts about an original post or something (I thought you had eleventh thoughts about your posts when I saw how many new posts there were in the Inspire me thread ). So I didn't see post 45 until just a few minutes ago.

Of course I don't mind if you write about Bierce. I look forward to reading it. Unless you've already written it, which is fairly likely, because I'm a bit... ahem, behind.

I had to reinstall the whole system, but it's working fine.

Well, I figure that if we're going to shoot for that, it's going to require some convincing, and getting support, which will be part of what we need. We've got to stretch it out. Make a campaign of it. But that is an important thing. We porkpies don't historically take italic decrees likely.

Please do email me with your ideas about what else would help. Naturally, mine doesn't address the unedited and UG problems, but the unedited guide isn't my specialty, as we both know.

I meant something I hadn't got round to. Poor old Ambrose had gotten forgotten.

You know the Fairy Feller's Master Stroke? That's the current project. Substantial amazing material from nadia. Needs major work to shape it and do it justice, but - wow - it's so powerful that its in my dreams.

I'll try e-mail as you suggest. But you already no-no'd some of it, didn't you?

That happens Still wish I would have been able to respond earlier.

I don't think I know that. But if it's something you think is worth doing, I'll be happy to look at it. Too bad about nadia, eh? One of the great ones.

I did no-no some of it, yes. We've got to be realistic, now. The italics need to be strongly behind anything we propose, and they just won't change things too radically, I think. We should definitely help that along in the unedited guide though with every weapon in our arsenal.

(that's you!)

Yeah, right.

You know what's wrong with PR, don't you? Dead simple, but never touched on in any of the supposedly-insightful current Convos - at least as far as I can see.

The Scouts and their ilk treat reading Entries as a task. They work to subconscious quotas. They develop a subliminal dislike for more challenging Entries, because then they have to think, and that slows them down. Same goes for long Entries. PR naturally migrates to shallow, shortish Entries. Easy pickings. The Scout feels productive, and doesn't particularly care - or even realise - that he's cultivating pap.

Well, some of the best entries are short entries, but the best researched ones aren't. Naturally, some topics are better suited to a short entry. I just recommended a very short entry. If it had been any longer, it wouldn't have been worth reading.

Bels held a phrase in his nickname for a while - 'brevity is wit'. A short, witty entry is good.

Myself - I'm *trying* to make a conscious effort to work on quality over quantity. My next two entries for the EG should be two of my best ever, I think. It'd be nice if we could just get people to try to 'top' themselves every time they write an entry.

OK. . Right.

I decided all this theoretical stuff (here and in the various PR talking-shops)was getting us nowhere, and so I went looking for a suitable totem in PR right now that. We need something we can make a case around.

Trouble is, there aren't any. The closest (IMO) is possibly A2879409 but it's already been attacked with some justification for covering old ground, it's UK-centric, it's not especially well done and it isn't an Entry that 'needed to be written'. It doesn't pass the 'lightweight' test, remember?

What's really needed is an Entry with the following characteristics :
- great subject, with 'Why didn't I think of this?' quality. Ideally, perhaps, one taken on from 'Challenge h2g2', with a bit of senior Scout or even italic blessing already.
- respected author. Not someone with an iconoclast reputation - like me. Someone who's made a universally-acknowledged contribution to the Guide, but who's also sceptical enough to ask tough questions and gifted enough to write a vibrant and unorthodox Entry.
- top drawer writing quality. Something that seems perfectly complete and fulfilling as a reading experience, so that presuming to improve it will seem like an act of desecration.

Like you say, we need Ben. Even her own triumphs, though, like Rude Words, have a one-off feel. As if allowing the occasional exception with a great palaver reinforces the rule.

I've tried to do this myself at least seven times : Gorgon, Gunson, Flixborough, (all of which failed), Batavia (that was EG'd almost unscathed), Blake (that more or less survived, probably thanks to italic sub-ed treatment), and Lee and Winstanley (which both went into the EG minus their intended companion pieces).

Possibly a compilation of great Entries that PR refused is the way forward? Maybe we should all (both?) list our Top Ten? (This is where vanity gets in the way. I honestly believe that the majority are my own).

I'm going to think some more. Maybe I am going have to write another Gunson, say, if only because no-one else will. Maybe it's time to pick up the great unfinished project on the Palais Ideal - that one, too, is intrinsicaly symbolic of the PR-malaise. It describes brilliant unorthodoxy versus drab normality, for the first time since Gorgon.

Some more. Think. Yes. . Quite.

Here's one from late last year - A3051802
I fought with the italics for its inclusion (kicked up quite a fit, actually), and I threatened to have it rejected from the UG because of the 'No EG-suitable entries'. Still think I was right. Jimster used every lame excuse he could think of without actually saying 'h2g2 ain't what it used to be'.

There's this - A3940887.
But then again, three of the most critical people in PR have already commented on it and seem to be fine with it. It's not in any way great, but it's the sort of thing I would expect to have a tough ride in PR. Maybe not.

I don't see what the point of a 'What PR Refused'. What will it do? Encourage people to submit unacceptable entries to PR? Might bother the scouts a bit, but that's all the good it could do

If only this was two years ago. Then we'd have Ben, the full italics and pre-UG time. We're going to have to do the best with what we've got. But we still need Ben.

'What PR Refused', done well, would show what we're missing. I don't mean listing stuff that's clearly not EG-fit. I mean stuff that could have been accepted, given only a more flexible attitude, and that's a much better read than the EG norm.
The cancer Entry is a valid example.

The balloon thing - pathetic, really. Very insubstantial, and the only possible reason people will be amused by it is it's 'naughtiness'. Good pornography, of course, makes us run a mile.

Poor old Jimster. I'm fairly sure he sympathises. His problem is, the more change he accommodates, the more overworked he is. Let's face it, hootoo is now staffed at tickover maintenance level. If someone actually adjusts the machinery, there isn't enough manpower to manage the outcome.

Two years ago? Good times. Better times. But the same cause was fought then and it was dismissed with vigour. Perhaps it might be easier to champion change in a time of decadence.

Come on, Jodan. We're just talking about it. Let's do something, like offer that stuff I wrote (suitably modified, to reflect your opinion) to shazz.

You never commented on the usefulness of me writing more problem Entries, either. What do you think? If some of the two-year-ago battles were re-enacted, might we get somewhere? Because if you say yes, I'll give it my best shot. (The stuff I've been putting into PR recently might be getting a better reception, but it isn't stretching me any, so where's the use in that?)

I'm giving a lecture on Tuesday night, as it happens. The text of that, a little reworked, could make for Peer Review fireworks.

Pin (itching)

That would be valid, but there isn't enough stuff out there. There's your stuff, the cancer entry... nothing else comes to mind.

Jimster isn't going to be the one doing the extra work with creative, interesting stuff. It'll be the ones that start the revolution. A revolution ain't complete when you tear down the old system - we have to be ready to build up too.
To lead by example.
You're going to have to take the lead on that, because I'm going to be learning with the rest of the community.

Now if we're going to build as well as tear down, we have to give an idea of what we'll be building while we're tearing. That's where I see problem entries coming into use. Not just to pick a fight.

Of course, there is something to be said for picking a fight. We need a battle ground. Gosho's thread isn't going anywhere, and the Post article will, at most start a few threads with one or two people. I say go for it. Run some ideas by me first (email) before you do it though.

I can't quite put my finger on why, but right now is definitely a better time for action than 2 years ago. So let's run the Post Article (Waz's comments too. I thought we were waiting for Ben, but that's looking a bit like waiting for Godot at this point)

Here we go again...

Yeah, so it was the wrong place to be talking about that, but it wasn't me who started it, and I was honestly trying to be civil and forthright. I thought I was doing a good thing, and saying something that was important enough and sound enough to build on.
I don't know why you read it as confrontational (which you obviously did, posting before any other comeback).
I wasn't actually rude, was I? And I think it was all true.
It was just maybe confrontational as in the sense of 'checkmate'.
Or am I trying to make a point only I can see?

Trouble is, you can show some people the inevitable and it only fuels their denial. Or, put another way, you can try to stiffen their resolve and instead you finish up justifying their cowardice.

Do you think I should leave?
Or just resign as a scout?
Or lie even lower for a while?
Or what?

I'm at a low, Jodan.

Oh crap, I completely missed this

No, I think what you said needs to be said. I don't want the UG to become a part of it though. For one thing, the UG isn't a forum from which to battle the EG. I just have to look out for the future of the UG as much as possible, and I just can't take risks with that.

I don't think you should leave, or resign as a scout or lie lower. Decisions are made by those who show up, Pin. I think you should show up. If anything, don't lie lower. Stand up and say that you will be heard. The scouts are a body that could be an instrument of enormous good to the EG, but those who want to maintain the status quo outnumber the voices of change. (If you want to go into specifics on that, it'll have to be by email - there are certain people annoyingly subscribed to this private thread that I'd rather not have reading specifics)

Decisions are made by those who show up - and a failure to show up will not do anyone any good.

I guessed you probably had. You're Convo list rattles round about hourly, so I put in a home message, so you wouldn't, well...miss it.

Decisions are made by those who show up?
Would it were true. Decisions round here are made by those who join the herd. Trust a sheep to miss that one.

But heartfelt thanks for the words. You're one hell of a diplomat, whatever anybody else says about you

Anyhow, I feel a bit better about life. I actually wrote something for PR, too. It's quite a penance that; every time you slag off the Edited Guide, you have to offer it an Entry in absolution.

Just think how I'd have to be to catch up with you!

It is true, Pin. If you don't show up, you can't join the herd, or in your case, start your own herd. You're welcome in my herd any time. Just as long as you leave the UG out of the EG crusade, alright?

I intend to read that thing. I unsubscribed from PR recently because I found it was preventing me from commenting on entries, so I just saw it.
It's my turn to be solemn right now though. I'm trying to work out an entry on the Tomb of the Unknowns in Arlington, Virginia and it's not easy