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

I was very excited about the upcoming redesign. I loved the new FP with the dolphin and emphasis on Douglas Adams, and have been hoping that the redesign would be an opportunity for the community to come alive again, new people joining, old one's coming back and an actual renewal or the place.

There were lots of problems identified in the beta testing in November. Now that the new site has been semi-launched I have to say it's sufficiently bad that I'm not using it. I'm working very hard in RL at the moment, and even though the weekends are pretty quiet at h2g2 these days I was still looking forward to hanging out here for a few days and checking out the new toys. But it's so bad that not only am I using alabaster but I don't even want to be onsite. I don't think I've felt like that about h2g2 before, and that's what's upsetting me.

There's lots of discussion happening in Announcements, Ask, and the new Feedback pages, and I'm sure on Monday the Eds will start responding. The problem is that I can't shake this feeling that the things that are important for the community to function, the things that *enable* our communication (and in the end communication is what this place is all about) have been dropped either because they're invisible to TPTB or they're considered unimportant.

I just feel like we've been waiting a long time for the bbc to put something into h2h2 to revitalise it (all last year we've been waiting), and now the Eds and the tech people are saying 'didn't we do well?', and we've been left with a site that doesn't actually work.

I really want to swear now.

Judging by the apostrophe errors, Ancient Brit seems to be the only person using burlesque. For some reason that's cheered me up a bit

Yep Ancient Brit using burlesque is superb

(I'm still in my Ford Popular Brunel )

I have to say I was excited and now feel disappointed. I have gone back to Brunel for functional reasons mainly to do with not being able to jump into threads and read the backlog.

I'll have to make time to road test the new version and feed back. Not sure when though?

t.

AlaBlaster here

OMG, I've just looked up the meaning of burlesque. I knew the variety show meaning, but didn't realise it also meant this:

>.
1 a parody or comically exaggerated imitation of something, esp. in a literary or dramatic work : the funniest burlesque of opera | [as adj. ] burlesque Shakespearean stanzas. See note at caricature .
• humor that depends on comic imitation and exaggeration; absurdity : the argument descends into burlesque.
<<




Maybe we should call for a boycott of the new site. I feel bad even suggesting that, especially for Sam and Chris. But I also feel incredibly disappointed and let down, that they (all TPTB involved) *still* don't get that it's the ability to communicate and how the technology makes that possible that underpins this place. We're about to become just another forum and it's breaking my heart.

Hi turvy

One of the reasons I don't like being so negative about it is because I hope people will go and try it out and find ways of making it work and the good things about it. Let us know how you get on.

I'm looking at some of the new Feedback threads appearing on my convo list and thinking 'what's the point?'. What's the point of reading them all, or reporting bugs and losses, when we did all this in the beta and not much came of that?

Hi kea

I don't want to be negative either but as you say RL does get in the way and I have so much on my plate at the moment I'm struggling to think of a reason to stay once the redirect is set up.

I'm happy that I can still use the old site for now though.

Off to bed soon... It's been a very long day indeed.

t.

Sweet dreams

I also was so excited, optamistic over the past week, learning finally we were to get the new, updated, version of H2G2 to take us up to date. Like an excited child on Christmas morning I tore off the pretty wrapping paper, expecting to find my new bicycle, only to discover a cunningly disguised second-hand copy of a dictionary, that isn't even the OED version.
I'm now even more shocked to discover that some people are saying that some of the 'bugs' or missing functionality were aspects highlighted back in November.
If this had happened to me in my las job we'd ahave lost the contract, and not been paid; if your told of a bug, fault, failure to comply with specifications as regards functionality whilst the project is still in the development/design stages, then you fix it. There isn't a debate on that you fix it, sometimes we'd be fixing it until 7 AM having started at 7 Am the previous day, its just what you have to do. You don't release it and say, 'look isn't it great', when you know*it is full of failures to comply to specifcations and full of bugs which have already*been identified.
At this*point where we are, we should be identifying 'peculiar' bugs, bugs which only become apparent when a user does an utterly strange and unexpected (by the designers), set of interactions with the site, which, as it wasn't anticipated, produces an undesirable result.... E.G., user creates two entrys, with the same name, and suddnely a weird bug sprouts up, in which the second entry automatically gets moderated (of course I'm making this example up, but its the kidna thing Imean....)
I want a new H2G2, a shiney new H2G2, a H2G2 which is more user-friendly to newcomers to the site, which can grow, move on, develop, gain new user's, and new writers, but as it is... I don't see that*H2G2.

That's what's really worrying me - it's not like they haven't had warning about these issues. They've known for over 2 months.

I want my shiny new toy too! I'm starting to feel for Sam and Chris when they get back on Monday to all this. I hope they already know how bad it's going down and don't come back expecting us to be all chipper and excited.


>>only to discover a cunningly disguised second-hand copy of a dictionary, that isn't even the OED version.



The cunning disguise being the dolphin on the cover? (just as well there weren't any bleedin' hobbits involved).

>I'm starting to feel for Sam and Chris when they get back on Monday to all this.<

Funny I don't. They are *paid* to do a job.

Exactly...
I know from time to time, on h2g2, the doommongers bacon-theifs and harfengers of doom occasionally have, over the years, cried the death of h2g2, declaired it 'not as it once was', etc., and I've managed in nearly ten years here, to never jump on tany of those bandwagons... but even I feel this time... If I were particularly of the scaremongering badger-worrying crew, I'd be tempted to start thinkign this wasn't all some of pre-planned way of neatly making the site in a form which was destined, on purpose, to fail... I'm not... so I won't, but the thought crossed my mind quite a lot earlier today alogn such lines...
I know the 'new H2G2' was a larger undertaking than the website design/implimentation work I was involved in, but, I was part of a group working on the sizes of projects we* worked on, and I'd have thought for a site like h2g2, the people doing teh design/development/redesign would be a group used to handling bigger projects, yet all I've seen is a site, supposdily 'finished' to the point at which you can release it to 'real world' user's, which, well to compare it to the sites we worked on, this looks more like at the wireframe stage; you've had a few ideas, roughly draft them together, wshow em to a few user's plus the people who're comissioning you, and then you take one* of those wireframes forwward, and knock up a more 'finished' version, test again with 'experts', and some more user's, and repeat until you end up with the finished article (which then goes to full on user testing, performance/stability testing, usability testing (with experts), accessibility testing, etc.... It just doesn't look anything like a remotely finished project, either the design company have screwd up, or... dunno... just seems fishy..I'd have thought the BBC, of all people ougta be able to project manage and get the right people for the job... I may try to keep a lower profile on here over the weekend, in the hope that the bicycle will arrive on Monday, if not in person then at least some sense that its on order and just on its way to the collection depo...

Kea, you've caught my mood exactly in Post 1. I'm starting to lose faith in the survival of this site as a place I want to be.

I seem to be coming down with the flu or a bad cold, so that explains some of why I feel so shit today.

One thing that interests me is that the guy in the blogpost said that the bbc consulted well with the users. I don't think that's true. Yes they did some testing in London, and then they let us trial the beta. But they didn't actually come to us at the start and say we need to change the site, we want to get it right so all you lot stick around and new people come here and be happy, so please tell us what's important. If they'd done that they would have gotten the cream of consultation - all our input from a place we love and all donate time and energy to.

What I really can't understand is how they've dropped all those functional things *and haven't even bothered to mention them*. Because I'm fairly sure the things they've dropped are the things that we would have said we wanted to keep.

I've never understood why h2g2 staff haven't utilised the community in this way, used us a resource for developping the place. Are they worried that if they ask us what we want and then don't give us all of it we'll throw the toys out of the pram? Or is it that there is a culture amongst forum owners to not actually consult with the members (I notice this on other forums too), because.... some weird power hierarchy which says we own the place and you're just the end user?

Yes but kea, why were you and lots of others going on about how much you liked the *look*. You know my opinion..and really I think the functionality of it very much refelcts the *look*

I don't understand why so many people loved the bland look. They were loving getting all that praise.

Hi Ivan. I'm sorry to hear that but comforted too. At least there are lots of people not happy so there's a chance they will fix things, or some of them.

Really kea people should just stop being so pathetically nice towards the Eds. They are paid good money to make sure that the people doing the overhaul do a good job, before starting threads with, 'Good news everyone'.

Who the hell is going to take responsibility?

I've read in loads of places on h2g2 how upset people are.

But you can be certain that the BBC staff will carry on drawing their wages and putting out messages and starting threads that are totally misleading and untrue.

WE're being *conned*.

I guess I'm torn between empathising with people who've put alot of love and energy into a project that hasn't actually worked and is likely to give them alot of grief, vs how pissed off I am that they've gone off for the weekend leaving us without any answers.

I don't feel conned, I feel betrayed. I've been looking through some of the beta Feedback threads. I'd like to make a list at some point of what was raised then and what kind of response there was. Some things we were told we were going to lose - Who's online (but it was meant to be replaced with something the FP, which may still be in the pipeline). But mostly the Eds were saying thanks for the feedback, we'll look into that, which gave me the impression that it was likely something we would keep. At the very least they could have come back and told us a list of features we would be keeping and losing. There appear to be other things that were meant to be ready for the launch. I don't know if they've been dropped or are still on the way.

ARSE!

Where is Taff anyway? Shouldn't he be here kicking up a storm? And where is everyone else?

I'm not torn.

Do you know the Barmy Army song?

You're getting sacked in the morning

(Actually the thought of singing that has cheered me up a bit