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

Just one thing, Jodan: where do the italics fit into the picture? Because they *are* the bottleneck on any new initiative. If there's going to be a movement (and it pays to check out if this is indeed a general consensus), then they have to be convinced, somehow. So let me ask the tough question: how?

Interesting question. My sense is that the current Italics are more inclined to go with the community's lead. They have the power to reject entries recommended by scouts, obviously. I am sincerely hoping that they will see the community behind an effort to open the guide up, and allow it to evolve. If they need to be convinced, I have lots of words to use.

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Well, I'm just back, more than a little crush because of the loss of the top ranked Ohio State football team (previously undefeated) but otherwise fine I've had some of these ideas bottled up in me since Wednesday, so forgive the long, steam-of-consciousness post...

I'm not sure what facebook has to do with h2g2. It fills an entirely different purpose. If you would rather spend your time shuffling through facebook photos, fine. h2g2 is more intellectual, and it's more about meeting new people rather than staying in touch with old friends. Both are very social, and can be entertaining, though.

"Personally, I think that the momentum in PR is just beginning to pick up again and you should keep your powder dry for a couple of weeks."

I find that whole idea to be ridiculous. Really. It reinforces the misconception that focusing on quality somehow diminishes the site's capacity for absorbing more entries. It's not an either-or situation. People are capable of being convinced to write an entry and write it creatively.

Furthermore, debate does not hurt Peer Review. Debate, especially at the critical junctures when it is most relevant to the site's present, is essential to Peer Review. The fact that some people bring or otherwise find conflict and strife in such debate is unfortunate. I'm generally vigorous in my beliefs, but civil, and I think that that is the only way to change anything.

This debate needs to happen, and I think that in order for precedent to be set, there needs to be an example. Just like a high court can only set precedent or make a decision based on a court *case*, precedents in Peer Review will only be set by getting *entries* through the process. The timing is irrelevant, though I would say the sooner, the better if we want h2g2 to have a long term future. Things are not changing currently, and based on the present system, PR activity will begin to decline soon once again. Why? Because the "pull" of bringing entries into PR through a movement will exhaust itself, and there's not enough "push" in the community to make up for that. I don't mean to denigrate this burgeoning movement, I really don't, but it (and any movement of its kind) must by necessity motivate people to write based on survival, guilt, favors and pleading. Those are not things that will inspire people to write once those factors are removed. It is a short term fix.

I very strongly believe that bringing more openness and inclusivity to the guide will result in more "push" - a long term fix. In that sense, an effort to open the guide up - the value I am concerned with - is complementary to efforts to increase the quantity of entries. They have the same ultimate aims - the survival and relevancy of h2g2 and its content. That's why I reject the idea that pushing for opening the guide up will in any way be detrimental to it, in the short term or the long term.

These issues of a lack of entries are merely symptoms of a larger malaise and lack of interest in the guide. What's happening is we're treating the symptoms, but not the disease. I've spoken to Skanky on his PS about this, and I can't think of a better way to put it... we need a new culture of writing around here. It should respect alternative contributions and really allow the site to grow. For an encyclopedia that's all about being 'unconventional', our Writing Guidelines are inflexible and unchanging, which is a problem.

h2g2 is irrelevant unless we focus on producing high-quality entries. I'd rather have 1 excellent, entertaining, unconventional entry on the front page a day than five wikipedish entries. By focusing on quantity, we are in effect trying to compete with sites like wikipedia, and when we do that, we lose. h2g2 must play to its strengths, which means having interesting and entertaining content, written with élan. If we want to attract new writers, let's give them an example that will make them aspire to the level of entry which the guide expects. Without that, we will continue to lose new users and we'll have nothing with which to entice the old and new to stay put.

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Absolutely Jodan. Excellent post. We should be creating entertaining entries, which aren't restricted by so much dogma.

An interesting discussion. I've barely visited the site for nearly a year but I was a fairly regular contributor for six or seven, and I've been a member for over eight (does this make me a Low Number? One of the first 100,000 anyway), but... I haven't gone anywhere near the EG since January 2000, and I think this may have a bearing on what you're talking about.

I have two EG entries but they both went in under the old pre-BBC system where submitted articles went into a queue to be individually vetted by h2g2 staff - the problem was that this generated a massive backlog - the articles I wrote in January made it in five months later. I didn't necessarily mind this as I knew (or hoped) the person who eventually assessed my writing would be a professional site employee who would make a fair and balanced decision about it, and that if it made it in the article would still be my original conception.

The prospect of writing something which I would then have to rewrite and justify and haggle over with a group of people whose knowledge of the subject I have no way of evaluating and who would no doubt bring their own personal agendas (which, once again, I would have no idea about) to the discussion... well, that sounds like work to me, and it's not what I come (came) here for. I'm not saying the current system is horribly flawed and I certainly don't have a better alternative to suggest, but I'm just stating a fact. Going through PR doesn't appeal, which is why the overwhelmingly vast majority of my work isn't in the Guide proper.

(Yeah, I'm a lazy and arrogant person. I know. But it doesn't change the facts.)

I hate to say it but writing for a wiki is much more accessible and fun... but then again I don't do that anymore either, partly because I got sick of having my work rewritten by people with less writing talent, often simply to make it adhere to the 'manual of style' (style being used in a very loose sense).

I do use Facebook but mainly to stay in touch, I don't meet new people there (but the games and film reviewing applications are fun).

Thinking out loud, h2g2 sort of falls into the netherland between a wiki and a social networking site (henceforth SNS). People have talked about elitism in the EG and PR... I'm not necessarily saying that the current systems are elitist but I think it may be the case that the EG as a project is effectively elitist as the number of people willing to invest time and effort in such a comparatively high-maintenance undertaking is inevitably going to be limited.

I like h2g2. I've enjoyed contributing and I've made at least one good friend who I've met in RL... but, given the BBC's current funding issues and the fact that the site seems to be lacking either mass appeal or a clear, distinctive purpose, I sort of fear the worst.

Sorry, I'm sleep-deprived right now: my point is that it may not matter how you push the PR envelope or attempt to shake up the system, because it may be the PR system itself that makes contributing to the EG unattractive for some people, but given that it's only the PR system that distinguishes the Guide from W*k*p*dia, you're faced with the possibility that this site is only ever going to have niche appeal. I hope I'm wrong though.

Hey Awix... good to see you about.

One of the things I'm in favor of is making PR more content-focused, and less style/spelling/grammar focused. I understand when a sentence needs to be changed because it doesn't make sense, or if a certain phrasing is unclear, but PR is the absolute worst place for nitpicking. It's my least favorite part of submitting an entry to PR (and I just got a long list of typos and errors in one of my PR threads, and I'm dreading going back to fix them). Usually, I can root out a lot of errors by simple proofreading, which is something I think is reasonable to expect of writers. However, beyond that, subbies, curators, EFers and even Editors are the best people to deal with non-content related problems with an entry.

I think that removing the pedantic and nitpicky nature of PR would make it at least a bit easier on new authors and old ones, disillusioned with the system. In this sense, we have something to learn from wikipedia, which allows content producers to write their articles, and then future readers, editors and writers fix small problems as they see them.

Yeah, I've tried to pop in occasionally but the intensely annoying nature of most Japanese word processors ultimately stopped me from contributing as much as I once did. Next year I'll be in Italy so that should make things a little easier, I hope...

Anyway - it's invidious to compare h2g2 and wikipedia but they're clearly both expressions of the same concept (which, btw, I first heard when DNA made a TV show about it back in 19-frickin'-90 - the man was a visionary!). h2g2 is older but wikipedia is clearly much more successful in terms of size, profile, and popularity.

I think it's an accessibility thing - it's never going to be as easy to get your stuff into the h2g2 EG as it is into wikipedia. To be honest I think the way forward would be to try and put distance between the Guide and Wikiland by moving away from dry objectivity and going for oddball topics, more opinionated writing, and an emphasis on stylish and engaging prose - which might entail PR becoming just a proofreading service, and would definitely change the whole tone and purpose of the site. But it would hopefully attract talented writers and other people as well as blurring the line between the social aspects of h2g2 and the EG (said line surely not being a good thing), thus boosting the stickiness of the whole undertaking.

Apologies if I'm just recapping what you're already discussing. I am a Low Number so slow on the uptake sometimes...

Dammit - I only popped in for 5 minutes to see the front page today.

Here's what I said about the Rousseau piece he first time around -

"I never understand this fear of precedents - unless its in the parachute testing department - unless we're prepared to set new precedents we will stagnate and die.

For we above, read The Guide.

I like this one too, I find Rousseau's art deceptive, and consider this piece to be in his spirit.

Worthy of editing ? I think it would need an intro for that - a bare statement of Rousseau's life, leading to this is how it ends... - though it actually might work better as an outro. Or maybe we could accept that some subjects don't need to written for the uneducated, who probably wouldn't be that interested in the subject.

Boy I'd make a lousy Scout "

I don't think any of that has changed.

There are entries in the guide that I could have written better on subjects I know more about ~ butI didn't bother to write them, so I can't knock the guy who did, and he did add a lot of the stuff I suggested in PR.

h2g2 isn't Wiki - and Wiki is regarded as a joke in serious academic circles - the fact is that h2g2 is eclectic and that's what our entries should be. Before I submit an entry for review I read what Wiki has to say - if it covers it - and make sure mine has more in, or is personal, rather than encyclopaedic.

Where is wiki's entry on 'the crazy golf courses of the Isle of Wight' ? There isn't one,but h2g2 doesn't have to be oddball to survive or compete.

I suggest it has to unique, and growing.

The real way h2g2 will never compete with wiki is in accessibility. The outline with hyperlinks is what makes it a reference site, while you have to read an h2g2 article from start to finish, making it more literary.

If our site is built for the literary, then perhaps we ought to be literary...

Just musing here. I'm coming around.

Absolutely. I love the fact that I can write entries on ridiculous subjects on h2g2, . I like the fact that I can write essays on h2g2 (A8379507 is nothing more than an ill-formated, prolonged essay on the American Dream) and I can insert reasoned opinion into an entry (whether the reviewers realized it or not, A4814110 is an incredibly opinionated entry, which, though pointing out the arguments for and against, definitely comes out in favor of the for side).

The best part? h2g2 doesn't "flag" a section of an entry for containing an opinion or original idea, as if that is some kind of horrible vice. h2g2 allows us the opportunity to *present* a subject. Some choose to do it straight-forwardly, some choose to present a subject in a particular light. The point is that a particular format is not enforced upon you. There are a few silly rules here on h2g2, but it's not all that bad.

Opposing the opening of the guide, favoring restrictions which prevent creative presentation of subjects is almost wikipedian in nature. I think that the tendency is to believe that if we stop hand-sewing our product and turn it over to a sewing machine, it will lose some of its quality, but at least we'll have more. The problem is that if we're worried about producing more of our product, we're suddenly competing against a massive sewing machine, nuclear powered, with thousands of operators (which incidentally produces an superlatively inferior product) and we've got a hand crank and a foot pedal. Debates about wikipedia are irrelevant, because we operate in a different niche.

Maybe the best part is that, as a community, if we keep hand-sewing, we'll just keep getting better at it, faster, stronger... until we're winning on our own terms.

Did I drag out that sewing metaphor too far?

I can only say I agree wholeheartedly with what you've said here Jodan, (sewing machines and all), I can't add anything to it.

Leo's question about the italics is a good one. I don't know how much say or influence h2g2 researchers have, nor how it's possible to express what the community, or the writing-active community maybe, would like or how to measure the strength of its feelings. And how loud is the silence of the writing-inactive community ? Zero, or ten?

For that matter, there's the danger of groupthink. And the silent majority. Perhaps set up two pages, one for, one against, and spam the boards to get everyone to comment?

I love this place. Where else can you take a chance with a guy who claims to be in competition with a massive nuclear-powered sewing machine?

Well, I don't know how much else there is to say since no one is really arguing with me. It's an odd feeling for me I considered starting a group, like Skanky's, but I thought it would be perceived as being in competition with Skanky's, which I didn't want to see. I dunno. I'm more of a grassroots kind of guy than a top-down, group, kind of person.

Thing is Jodan I think what you're saying is pretty much what a lot of people are feeling, or at least can relate to. But, and I can only speak for myself, there is a definate feeling of what do we do now?

I come up with things that I think could be done, but to be honest I think people just think I'm barking mad (or just an annoying moaning git - or both ). But seriously people will listen to you Jodan, and thats why we're here. I think some people are happy to sit out the end of the guide or watch it dwindle to obscurity (and I think some actually want there to be only five people and a dog chatting on the forum, sending edited Guide entries for each other to read). But I if nothing else feel that we at least need to make the Itallics aware of what we want - and at least for them to give us an honest answer if its possible.

And just for the record, I'm not sure that whipping people in to writing for the Guide (and essentially blaming them for the downfall of the Guide) is necesarily a good idea. People will write if they want to. So, and I know I'm repeating myself, we need to get to the root of the problem and find out why people aren't writing for the Guide.

Its just I've seen a few posters lately posting saying that you must write for the Guide, and I'm worried (not saying that it is yet but) it could turn in to some Guilt-trip fuelled campaign that is only going to serve to wind people up.

Rather than look at why people don't write for the Guide perhaps it would serve well instead to look at why they do, their motivations and expectations as to what they hope to accomplish in doing so.

"Rather than look at why people don't write for the Guide perhaps it would serve well instead to look at why they do, their motivations and expectations as to what they hope to accomplish in doing so. "

Well I think looking at both angles would be useful. A holistic viewpoint.

Interesting though. Why do the people who still write for the guide, want to write for the Guide? Prestige? Showing their work in peer review, and developing their skills?

Though with the last as Awix pointed out earlier, what opportunity is there to judge the quality of the judgement?

I'm working on a project right now on this subject...