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

>>> I get it now, is it a general consensus then that barlesque is easier for readers but rubbish for everything else?

I can't read Barlesque for more than a few minutes; it gives me eyestrain and headache. I do like the dolphins, though. Brunel is hideous, but very easy for me to read.

Somewhere there must be an accessibility tester, laughing his off.

It struck me the Hub is a richsource of advice on all these topics: http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/hub/Help

Peanut

I was so busy wincing at the painfil truths you uncovered when you looked around to see why people didn't stick with us that I forgot to ask you how you did your looking around and where you found these uncomfortable truths?

I googled and googled, as I said not very scientific I can't cite my sources. Went through comments sections in the papers when BBC made the announcements, we were mentioned in students room, three bloggers who made that shift to blogging/wiki, rest was conversation forums but honestly couldn't say what they were. Boardreader was a bouncing point.

I was coming back to that post today, but while I have fresh eyes I was going to go back to Tavaron's thread first

That's great, Peanut. Thank you.

1 Never heard of us (surge of comments after BBC announced our disposal)
2 editorial process is a pig
3 it's a pig to get around the site

Fair enough. Those are problems we have with h2g2, also.

4 we're geeks

Yeah, so? Geeks are cool. We even have our own smiley: People who are stay here have learned to embrace their inner geek and write lovingly about what makes them geek out.

5 we think we are all it and a bag of chips
6 cliquey

This is a serious problem. Some h2g2ers manifest Not Invented Here syndrome. Others want to reinvent everything.

There is also the tendency to bellow at newbies for imagined transgressions, such as posting in someone's journal. Look, if it is really against the rules, why is there no rule posted and why does the software let you do it?

If we are serious about recruiting, it isn't enough to let people in the gate. Making someone feel welcome can mean helping them find a chair, making sure they also have some or and perhaps introducing them to other people at the party.

Who would like have a crack at summarising what we've got here, including saying where we've still got things to work out?

And where else do we have stuff on this topic?

As Happy Nerd pointed out, recruitment and retention are not the same thing. A bit of back story here. I seldom post, for the most part have never been overly active outside a certain portion of the guide yet I travel all about this place, nary a nook or cranny I haven't explored. The way I do this is by following writing that intruiqes me like Hansel and Gretel after a trail of breadcrumbs and just as in the story, that trail dissappears rather quickly in many cases.

It's in looking at the trails end that many things become clear. Sure, navigation can be daunting and jumping in to a pool blind is tough as well but not knowing how or where to begin may be the hardest part of all. And so it is that writers with real promise simply drift away, never having engaged in any real fashion.

As pointed out elsewhere an automated 'Ace' message detailing good places to begin posting would go a long way towards getting folks past the gate and to the party itself. For me it was 'Talking Point' and I was on from day one with a bunch of friendly denizens, many who were counted as old guard even then. It broke the ice after which I was in no way shy about posting, in fact I probably broke a lot of unwritten rules but so what, that's how you learn. The point is I got engaged in convos, was treated with common courtesy and respect and never felt the least bit patronized nor excluded due to being a noob. The simple fact is that most reaserchers are really nice people and act accordingly.

To end, get them engaged staight away and you have a better chance of keeping them active and of them finding that special nitche which will keep them coming back, even if they do take extended breaks from time to time.

"...an automated 'Ace' message detailing good places to begin posting..."

I cannot *wait* for this to be a reality. The ACE message needs to be instantaneous. We probably have between 5 and 30 minutes to get someone's attention. If we've lost it by then, most don't come back unless they asked a specific question.

I'm not talking minutes. I find old personal spaces where a reasercher has been for weeks or even months, journal entries and all but never any engagement outside of it for what appears to be a simple lack of how or where to begin.

Other times it's getting involved by submitting and never getting any communication after the intial comments. You can see they think this is how to get started but we all know it's not. And so they wait in the cold, nobody talking to them and eventually they drift away. It's been the story since the bginning and has never changed, no fault of anyone really, just a roadblock that has never been properly addressed.

I wonder if this is a reporting issue....

In theory we know who the new sign-ups are, so let's assume that's true and "new this week" actually works.

Would it help to have a report which showed "people who've posted less than n times"? - I've no idea what n would be - 5? 10?

And maybe a report which showed "people who've posted in less than n conversations" or "on less than n pages"? Again I've no idea how many n could be.

Then it would be possible to spot who'd got stuck in one place.

I've no idea if this is possible, by the way.....

Ben

What would be useful is to have a list of h2g2 sign ups. We haven't had that since we moved to Single Sign On.

Once we have that, we can do things like go through the list twice, six weeks apart (or whatever), to pick up those people who have posted since the initial ACE greeting (which we'll still have in addition to the automated message).

We can also utelise the New Entries list if it gives us more than the top ten.

One thing I can state with assurance is that the whole 'Last Posted' thing doesn't work. A personal space may say last posted in '04 when in fact they have dated posts in message, conversations or journal dating into '06. The little eyeballs? If I go to my personal space not logged it still shows I'm here. Sometimes when I am logged in there are no eyes at all.

I think the real issue is getting people involved in places where there is constant activity between all. That will get them posting which in turn will keep them active long enough to make friends and find their way. Maybe down the line they submit an entry, maybe they don't. The point is they stay active and at least ahve the chance to contribute, even if that only amounts to stimulating conversation.

I can't summerise the thread, sorry

I can say userability has been dealt with at Tavarons

Safeguarding is a seperate issue to engagement, I only raised it here as we discussing promoting the site to a specific age group.
A seperate email seemed acceptable for serious concerns

Editing process is dealt with elsewhere, again I raised it here, cos it causes gripes here but was also raised in my not very scientic research

Sorry forgot to ask what promotional plans have been raised already?

That's kind of what I am trying to find out Peanut.

B

Happynerd, no disrespect to geekness meant by me. I was just trawling through the net to try and get an idea on why peeps didn't click, join or stay.

In terms of sustainability, if we go down the advertising route do we need peep to sign up or do we just need hits?

What we'd need is to convince advertisers that enough people will see their ads to make it worth the cost. There's no need for them all to be subscribed users, although it's probably safe to say that the number of signed up users will increase in proportion with the number of overall readers.

The reason we need more signed up users is even more vital than the need for revenue: the site will suffer a slow death without more active contributors than there are now, no matter how much money there is in the kitty.

Sorry just to fire off questions, do we need active in terms of writing guide entries, engaging in forum converations, or both? If both how are these weighted (?sp)

Both, definitely. And I don't think one is more important than the other.