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

Yes, I agree also. I'm having a prolonged rest from PR and EGEs, but Im keeping in touch via some of the more trivial convo threads

I wrote because I used to enjoy writing, and because I've always had a thing about communicating my passion about my interest in the world to others. From my own personal perspective, the worst label you could attach to my writing would be 'boring'. 'Pedestrian' would come a close second.

But that's not why I started this thread. The online world has moved on a very long way since h2g2 was first launched. It has been crowded out in many ways by other enterprises that perform certain functions a lot better. As I've said before on sveral occasions, h2g2 needs to rediscover (or even, discover) its Unique Selling Points. I'd like to see more actual Field Research in the most literal sense of the word. More of the writing about real experiences, no matter how opinionated, and less of the book and browser-bound research that crowds the site right now. (This is why I stopped writing, as it happens, as I thought that my own output was becoming too formulaic). I can tell you one thing, it would be a hell of a lot more of an inclusive exercise than it is right now. Poeple who have never heard of h2g2 would start reading it, and some might even be encouraged to contribute.

Well the reason I started writing for h2g2 was to record information which I wanted to remember (and would know where to find) which I found difficult finding elsewhere on-line or in books.

As an educationist it appeals to me that other people might find my Entries to be o interest. However, my writing doesn't come into the same class that I admire in the best of hootoo - and that is where people hae used their own personal experiences. I aolso include your writings as among the best in hootoo, FM - I still chuckle from time to time over your 'How not to name a chemical compound' .

A

This is the sort of thing that really f---s me off and depresses me. A writer for whom English is a second language write a great little snapshot entry, http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/brunel/F48874?thread=7085389, in the true spirit of the EG. And the only comment one of our August and Venerated Researchers can amke about it is 'Writing "this Researcher" isn't any better than writing "I". It's still first person writing and should be reworded.' Well, bollocks to that. If there's a better example of not seeing the wood for the bloody trees, I'm yet to behold it. Some people are so flaming pompous. Grrr.

Thank you for your kind words, Big Al, but calling me one of the best writers on h2g2 is a bit like saying 'world famous in Croydon'. This isn't to belittle the efforts of other writers here, just that h2g2 is becoming loess relevant, not more, even as I speak.

I decided to put on the old curmudgeon's Doc martins and wade into a PR threa on Climate Change, a transparent attempt written by a denialist to get his views heard via the EG. No Scouts bothered to turn up at all, until my attitude started hardening and I started throwing down some difficult challenges. The I was told to be more helpful and to stop spoiling everyone's fun'.

Well, that just sums this place up. It's possible to be entertaining AND rigorous at the same time - just read Richard Dawkins - but around here, the latter is seen as being inimical to the former and the former should always take precedence. In other words, it doesn't matter whether anything isn't really accomplished of any use at the end of the day, just providing everyone has 'fun'.

h2g2 isn't a community. Communities tolerate their malcontents, if only because they tend to be the people who act as a spur for positive change. It's a KINDERGARTEN.

I thought Dawkins was bit schoolboyish to be honest.

'...but around here, the latter is seen as being inimical to the former and the former should always take precedence. In other words, it doesn't matter whether anything isn't really accomplished of any use at the end of the day, just providing everyone has 'fun'. '

Well, I've said elsewhere (a long time ago) that some Researchers on hootoo strive too hard to inject humour into their Entries - and much of the time IMHO it just doesn't work. It appears what it is - contived. .

But all done in homage to the Founder, who like many great comics delivered his stabs and slashes with a blade disguised as bendy foam.

Well, the Founder's dead. He had a murderous way with a phrase and made me laugh a lot I was in my late teens. Then he ran out of ideas for books and became much more interested in technology.

Had he lived, given enough time he would have got bored with this enterprise as well. Who knows what he would have been embracing at this moment? Perhaps now, it's time that we let Adams rest in peace, but I see his shade ever more frequently haunting much of the writing around here.

I'm glad some people find my writing amusing. That's because the subject matter is itself amusing, not because I'm a rapier wit: I'm not. Too often, though, h2g2 writers take a subject of utter tedium and expect to turn it into a hysterical digression, through some miraculous comic alchemy. The writers of this material shelter behind the idea of 'paying homage'. Nobody else is entitled to point out that this is lazy and formulaic either. It's patronising and self-indulgent and I'm f***ing sick of it.

This is what I think h2g2 really ought to be about:
* Popular scholarship. Everbody is an expert in some subject or another. I can pass myself off as one in the physical sciences and a couple of other things as well. There's an enjoyable opportunity to entertain and educate for all of us here.
* Sharing invaluable real life experiences. The entry about dealing with death and bereavement is soemthing we all have to do yet is talked about so little. It is also truly moving.
* Opinionated first hand reviews of culture. A few more Rough Guide-style entries wouldn't go amiss.

So, here's a challenge to anyone reading this. Write one of these entries. Inject a note of reality and/or erudition. Raise the
tone. Challenge others to do the same. And to the rest of you who think you'd rather carry on as usual, get a sodding life.