H2g2
Encyclopedia
h2g2 is a British-based collaborative online encyclopedia project
engaged in the construction of, in its own words, "an unconventional guide to life
, the universe
, and everything
", in the spirit of the fiction
al publication The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy from the science fiction comedy
series of the same name
by Douglas Adams
. It was founded by Adams in 1999 and was run by the BBC
between 2001 and 2011. It is often compared to Wikipedia
but there are differences between the sites.
The intent was to create an Earth
-focused guide that would allow members to share information about their geographic area and the local sites, activities and businesses, to help people decide where they want to go and what they may find when they get there. It has grown to contain subjects from restaurants and recipes, to quantum theory
and history
. Explicit advertising of businesses was forbidden when the site was run by the BBC, but customer reviews were permitted.
The content of the project is written by registered "Researchers" on its website. Articles written by Researchers form the "Guide" as a whole, with an "Edited Guide" being steadily created out of factual articles that have been peer review
ed via the aptly named "Peer Review". The Edited Guide includes both traditional encyclopaedic subjects and more idiosyncratic offerings, and while articles in the Edited Guide sometimes aim for a slightly humorous style, most are correct and well-written treatment of their subject matter by virtue of the Peer Review process. Every article has an associated discussion area which allows for multiple threads, called "Conversations".
edition of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
by the author of the series, Douglas Adams
, and his friends and colleagues at The Digital Village
. "h2g2" serves as a handy abbreviation
for that rather lengthy title, with the advantage that most people are able to spell it. The site was a runner-up for Best Community Site in the Yell.com awards in 2000.
Like other dot-com companies, Adams' company TDV
ran into financial difficulties towards the end of 2000 and eventually ceased operations. In January 2001, the management of the site was taken over by the BBC
, and moved to bbc.co.uk
(then known as BBCi). During this takeover there was a lengthy intermission during which the site was unavailable, which the community refers to as "Rupert" — a reference to the serendipitous naming of the fictional tenth planet in Adams' novel Mostly Harmless
. Members created an alternative site, "n2g2", standing for "Nowhere To Go To", to maintain their community while the site was down, and to complain about changes implemented by the BBC.
21 April 2005 marked the launch of h2g2 Mobile, an edition of the guide produced specifically for PDA
s (Personal Digital Assistants) and some mobile phones that could access the internet, so that people could read h2g2 entries while on the move. This was done because people wanted h2g2 to be much like the Hitchhiker's Guide described in the books — a mobile, electronic device that anyone could read from anywhere. An earlier attempt at a WAP
phone based version of h2g2 started in December 2000 only to end when the BBC took over the site in January 2001.
On 24 January 2011, the BBC announced cuts of 25% to its online budget, resulting in a £34 million less investment into the site. A number of sites are to be closed including BBC Switch
, BBC Blast and 6-0-6
. As part of this exercise, the BBC chose to "dispose of" h2g2 by selling it to someone else..
On 21 June 2011, it was announced the winning bid was a joint bid put together by three parties: Robbie Stamp
, h2g2c2 ('The h2g2 Community Consortium') and the owners of Noesis Systems Ltd (Brian Larholm and Alyson Larholm)
On 31 August 2011, it was announced the community was sold to Not Panicking Ltd, a company founded by Robbie Stamp
, Brian Larholm and Alyson Larholm, as well as The h2g2 Community Consortium.
On 3 October 2011 at approximately 09:30 local time, the BBC incarnation of h2g2 officially closed, leaving only an announcement reading "H2G2 has now left the BBC. The new owners of H2G2 are currently preparing the site for relaunch. Soon you will find The Guide to Life, the Universe and Everything at www.h2g2.com."
The post-BBC version of the site went live again on 16th October 2011. The 13 days of downtime leading up to this have been named by the community as "The Foop".
, Entries in Peer Review may be recommended by a volunteer Scout (see below) and accepted by the in-house team. When this happens, a copy of the Entry is passed to a volunteer Sub-editor (see below) for fact checking and general tidying, followed by a brief check by the in-house team. Entries appear on the site's home page on the day that they enter the Edited Guide.
As of 25 December 2010, there were 10,027 Entries in h2g2's Edited Guide, every one of which is an original work. For comparison, Wikipedia
had 3,123 Featured Articles and 10,602 Good Articles on that day. Since Wikipedia does not allow original research, all of these were derivative works.
ed by members of the community who feel like spending the time to read and comment. Reviewers may be specialists on the topic, but most are not and it soon becomes obvious whether the average Researcher can understand an Entry. While this has the advantage that Entries are generally written in terms that the layman
can understand, it also means that mistakes can occasionally slip into the Edited Guide.
Once an Entry has been picked by a volunteer Scout (see below) and leaves Peer Review, a copy is made and editing rights are handed to a Sub-editor. After the Entry has its day on the Front Page of h2g2 and becomes part of the Edited Guide it can be modified or updated by its author either by requesting minor changes through the Editorial Feedback section of h2g2, or by following the Update Forum process if larger changes or a rewrite are needed. However, the author can still update the original, unedited version, which remains in the wider unedited guide. Alternatively, they may choose to delete the unedited version, so that it does not show up in search
results.
and conform to the h2g2 house style.
Sub-editors may discuss changes with the Researcher who wrote the Entry to make sure that they are correct in their information and written in the right manner, but this is generally at the individual sub-editor's discretion. h2g2 lacks an effective change control system, and this occasionally leads to errors creeping in at this stage.
on an Entry.
. Typically, an Entry is moved from Peer Review after its author leaves h2g2 (known as 'Elvising', after Elvis Presley
's 'Elvis has left the building' tannoy announcements, which would be broadcast to fans at the end of his concerts).
If an article does not make it through the Peer Review process, the original (unedited) Entry can still be viewed, as before, in the Unedited Guide. It can, of course, also be rewritten and submitted again at a later date.
The UnderGuide is h2g2's most ambitious attempt to bring the attention of the community to the best entries that fall outside of the Edited Guide's Writing Guidelines. The UnderGuide volunteers have a similar structure to the Edited Guide's volunteers - Miners have an equivalent role to Scouts, and Gem Polishers perform a similar task to Sub-editors (see below). Miners operate within the Alternative Writing Workshop, to comment on entries and pick them for the UnderGuide.
(GMT/BST
) daytime, which is when the in-house London
based team (known as 'The Italics', see below), is there. But at other times, the US
, Canadian
and Australia
n researchers are also very active.
s of h2g2, are the only people who are paid) to work on the site. They monitor the content of the Edited Guide and oversee the general development of community life. They are named for the way their names appear in conversation threads, in bold italics, to keep people from impersonating them. There are other informal nicknames for the editors such as 'The Powers That Be', 'The Towers', 'The Powers in the Towers' and 'Pisa
People' (again, after the slanting nature of their on-screen nicknames).
The core personnel have completely changed since h2g2 started in 1999; since 2010, none of the original TDV
team have worked on the site.
s and societies, set up and maintained by Researchers. Examples include:
, published weekly by a team of community members. It includes cartoons, regular columns, fiction, poetry and feature stories written and submitted by the h2g2 Researchers. It is edited by dedicated h2g2 Researchers, not paid in-house editors. The Post provides an outlet for comment and for sharing experiences, and often features content that is not intended to form a part of the Edited Guide.
that may be used to view the site. Users can set a preference to view the site in one or other of the skins when they are logged in.
sites, while maintaining a degree of the site's old character.
to their articles, but grant Not Panicking Ltd a non-exclusive license to reproduce their work in all formats.
The House Rules prohibit various things, including racism
, "hard-core" swearing
, spamming, flooding, "otherwise objectionable" material, and spitting. Codes and languages other than English
may only be used sparingly and with an accompanying translation
. The Terms and Conditions are more legalistic, and prohibit breach of copyright and defamatory material.
When the site became part of BBCi, the BBC insisted on moderating
contributions to the site soon after they were made. However, they were eventually persuaded that the h2g2 Community could be trusted to a system of "reactive moderation", in which posts were not checked by moderators unless a complaint was made. On leaving the BBC, the moderation guidelines under Not Panicking Ltd have remained much the same. Individual user accounts are sometimes put on "pre-moderation", meaning that posts they make are not displayed until they have been reviewed by a moderator.
During their time with the BBC, particularly contentious major issues often led to discussion being moderated differently. For example:
Occasionally, more contentious Entries submitted for review are hidden pending moderation, with two articles about the Nestlé boycott
having been pulled in the past.
. The DNA technology was introduced a few months after the BBC takeover and is still used for BBC blogs, messageboards and commenting systems. Before this technology, there was "Ripley", which was named after the character
from the film Aliens
, in homage to the quote "I say we take off and nuke the entire site from orbit. It's the only way to be sure." Before that there was a technology with no particular name, which subsequently gained the retronym
Llama, due to the code holding the site together being written mostly in Perl
, the standard introductory textbook for which, Learning Perl
, has a picture of a llama
on the front cover.
Adams himself was rather involved in the website in its early days. His account name was DNA, and his user number was 42, a reference to the famous joke in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
that the Answer to the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything is 42. When Adams died in May 2001, his personal space was the focus for a huge reaction from the community. Adams' legacy is still felt on h2g2, and naturally the site is peppered with references to the Hitchhiker books; it is, however, not a fan site, and was never intended as such.
Internet encyclopedia project
An Internet encyclopedia project is a large database of useful information, accessible via the World Wide Web. The idea to build a free encyclopedia using the Internet can be traced at least to the 1993 Interpedia proposal; it was planned as an encyclopedia on the Internet to which everyone could...
engaged in the construction of, in its own words, "an unconventional guide to life
Life
Life is a characteristic that distinguishes objects that have signaling and self-sustaining processes from those that do not, either because such functions have ceased , or else because they lack such functions and are classified as inanimate...
, the universe
Universe
The Universe is commonly defined as the totality of everything that exists, including all matter and energy, the planets, stars, galaxies, and the contents of intergalactic space. Definitions and usage vary and similar terms include the cosmos, the world and nature...
, and everything
Everything
Everything is all that exists.Everything may also refer to:* Universe, everything we perceive to exist* Cosmos, the universe as an orderly system* World, the planet Earth, or the sum of human civilization...
", in the spirit of the fiction
Fiction
Fiction is the form of any narrative or informative work that deals, in part or in whole, with information or events that are not factual, but rather, imaginary—that is, invented by the author. Although fiction describes a major branch of literary work, it may also refer to theatrical,...
al publication The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy from the science fiction comedy
Comic science fiction
Comic science fiction is a sub-genre of science fiction that exploits the genre's conventions for comic effect. Comic science fiction often mocks or satirizes standard SF conventions like alien invasion of Earth, interstellar travel, or futuristic technology....
series of the same name
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is a science fiction comedy series created by Douglas Adams. Originally a radio comedy broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in 1978, it was later adapted to other formats, and over several years it gradually became an international multi-media phenomenon...
by Douglas Adams
Douglas Adams
Douglas Noel Adams was an English writer and dramatist. He is best known as the author of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, which started life in 1978 as a BBC radio comedy before developing into a "trilogy" of five books that sold over 15 million copies in his lifetime, a television...
. It was founded by Adams in 1999 and was run by the BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
between 2001 and 2011. It is often compared to Wikipedia
Wikipedia
Wikipedia is a free, web-based, collaborative, multilingual encyclopedia project supported by the non-profit Wikimedia Foundation. Its 20 million articles have been written collaboratively by volunteers around the world. Almost all of its articles can be edited by anyone with access to the site,...
but there are differences between the sites.
The intent was to create an Earth
Earth
Earth is the third planet from the Sun, and the densest and fifth-largest of the eight planets in the Solar System. It is also the largest of the Solar System's four terrestrial planets...
-focused guide that would allow members to share information about their geographic area and the local sites, activities and businesses, to help people decide where they want to go and what they may find when they get there. It has grown to contain subjects from restaurants and recipes, to quantum theory
Quantum mechanics
Quantum mechanics, also known as quantum physics or quantum theory, is a branch of physics providing a mathematical description of much of the dual particle-like and wave-like behavior and interactions of energy and matter. It departs from classical mechanics primarily at the atomic and subatomic...
and history
History
History is the discovery, collection, organization, and presentation of information about past events. History can also mean the period of time after writing was invented. Scholars who write about history are called historians...
. Explicit advertising of businesses was forbidden when the site was run by the BBC, but customer reviews were permitted.
The content of the project is written by registered "Researchers" on its website. Articles written by Researchers form the "Guide" as a whole, with an "Edited Guide" being steadily created out of factual articles that have been peer review
Peer review
Peer review is a process of self-regulation by a profession or a process of evaluation involving qualified individuals within the relevant field. Peer review methods are employed to maintain standards, improve performance and provide credibility...
ed via the aptly named "Peer Review". The Edited Guide includes both traditional encyclopaedic subjects and more idiosyncratic offerings, and while articles in the Edited Guide sometimes aim for a slightly humorous style, most are correct and well-written treatment of their subject matter by virtue of the Peer Review process. Every article has an associated discussion area which allows for multiple threads, called "Conversations".
History
h2g2 was founded on 28 April 1999 as the EarthEarth
Earth is the third planet from the Sun, and the densest and fifth-largest of the eight planets in the Solar System. It is also the largest of the Solar System's four terrestrial planets...
edition of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
The Guide (character)
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is a fictional electronic guide book in the multimedia scifi/comedy series of the same name by Douglas Adams. The Guide serves as "the standard repository for all knowledge and wisdom" for many members of the series' galaxy-spanning civilization...
by the author of the series, Douglas Adams
Douglas Adams
Douglas Noel Adams was an English writer and dramatist. He is best known as the author of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, which started life in 1978 as a BBC radio comedy before developing into a "trilogy" of five books that sold over 15 million copies in his lifetime, a television...
, and his friends and colleagues at The Digital Village
The Digital Village
The Digital Village was a digital media company based inCovent Garden, London WC2 in the United Kingdom. It was founded in 1994. The science fiction/comedy writer Douglas Adams was one of the founding members, along with Robbie Stamp, who is the Executive Producer of the Hitchhiker's Guide to the...
. "h2g2" serves as a handy abbreviation
Abbreviation
An abbreviation is a shortened form of a word or phrase. Usually, but not always, it consists of a letter or group of letters taken from the word or phrase...
for that rather lengthy title, with the advantage that most people are able to spell it. The site was a runner-up for Best Community Site in the Yell.com awards in 2000.
Like other dot-com companies, Adams' company TDV
The Digital Village
The Digital Village was a digital media company based inCovent Garden, London WC2 in the United Kingdom. It was founded in 1994. The science fiction/comedy writer Douglas Adams was one of the founding members, along with Robbie Stamp, who is the Executive Producer of the Hitchhiker's Guide to the...
ran into financial difficulties towards the end of 2000 and eventually ceased operations. In January 2001, the management of the site was taken over by the BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
, and moved to bbc.co.uk
Bbc.co.uk
BBC Online is the brand name and home for the BBC's UK online service. It is a large network of websites including such high profile sites as BBC News and Sport, the on-demand video and radio services co-branded BBC iPlayer, the pre-school site Cbeebies, and learning services such as Bitesize...
(then known as BBCi). During this takeover there was a lengthy intermission during which the site was unavailable, which the community refers to as "Rupert" — a reference to the serendipitous naming of the fictional tenth planet in Adams' novel Mostly Harmless
Mostly Harmless
Mostly Harmless is a novel by Douglas Adams and the fifth book in the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series. It is described on the cover of the first editions as "The fifth book in the increasingly inaccurately named Hitchhikers Trilogy"...
. Members created an alternative site, "n2g2", standing for "Nowhere To Go To", to maintain their community while the site was down, and to complain about changes implemented by the BBC.
21 April 2005 marked the launch of h2g2 Mobile, an edition of the guide produced specifically for PDA
Personal digital assistant
A personal digital assistant , also known as a palmtop computer, or personal data assistant, is a mobile device that functions as a personal information manager. Current PDAs often have the ability to connect to the Internet...
s (Personal Digital Assistants) and some mobile phones that could access the internet, so that people could read h2g2 entries while on the move. This was done because people wanted h2g2 to be much like the Hitchhiker's Guide described in the books — a mobile, electronic device that anyone could read from anywhere. An earlier attempt at a WAP
Wireless Application Protocol
Wireless Application Protocol is a technical standard for accessing information over a mobile wireless network.A WAP browser is a web browser for mobile devices such as mobile phones that uses the protocol.Before the introduction of WAP, mobile service providers had limited opportunities to offer...
phone based version of h2g2 started in December 2000 only to end when the BBC took over the site in January 2001.
On 24 January 2011, the BBC announced cuts of 25% to its online budget, resulting in a £34 million less investment into the site. A number of sites are to be closed including BBC Switch
BBC Switch
BBC Switch was the brand for BBC content aimed at UK teenagers. The brand launched on Saturday 20 October 2007 on BBC Two And ceased broadcasting on Saturday 17 December 2010...
, BBC Blast and 6-0-6
6-0-6
6-0-6 is a football phone-in, broadcast on BBC Radio Five Live throughout the football season; when the programme started, it typically went on air at 6:06pm on a matchday . It covers topics relating to the current affairs of football in the United Kingdom. It currently airs on Saturdays and...
. As part of this exercise, the BBC chose to "dispose of" h2g2 by selling it to someone else..
On 21 June 2011, it was announced the winning bid was a joint bid put together by three parties: Robbie Stamp
Robbie Stamp
Robbie Stamp was the CEO of The Digital Village, a position that came about partly because of his friendship with author Douglas Adams, whose works inspired the site. Stamp was also the executive producer of the movie version of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.Robbie was a producer of...
, h2g2c2 ('The h2g2 Community Consortium') and the owners of Noesis Systems Ltd (Brian Larholm and Alyson Larholm)
On 31 August 2011, it was announced the community was sold to Not Panicking Ltd, a company founded by Robbie Stamp
Robbie Stamp
Robbie Stamp was the CEO of The Digital Village, a position that came about partly because of his friendship with author Douglas Adams, whose works inspired the site. Stamp was also the executive producer of the movie version of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.Robbie was a producer of...
, Brian Larholm and Alyson Larholm, as well as The h2g2 Community Consortium.
On 3 October 2011 at approximately 09:30 local time, the BBC incarnation of h2g2 officially closed, leaving only an announcement reading "H2G2 has now left the BBC. The new owners of H2G2 are currently preparing the site for relaunch. Soon you will find The Guide to Life, the Universe and Everything at www.h2g2.com."
The post-BBC version of the site went live again on 16th October 2011. The 13 days of downtime leading up to this have been named by the community as "The Foop".
Edited Guide
Any h2g2 Researcher may write an article (known as an 'Entry') and then submit it to Peer Review for inclusion in the Edited Guide. Other users will review the Entry and suggest improvements, with the author making changes to their work as necessary. Following at least seven days' reviewingPeer review
Peer review is a process of self-regulation by a profession or a process of evaluation involving qualified individuals within the relevant field. Peer review methods are employed to maintain standards, improve performance and provide credibility...
, Entries in Peer Review may be recommended by a volunteer Scout (see below) and accepted by the in-house team. When this happens, a copy of the Entry is passed to a volunteer Sub-editor (see below) for fact checking and general tidying, followed by a brief check by the in-house team. Entries appear on the site's home page on the day that they enter the Edited Guide.
As of 25 December 2010, there were 10,027 Entries in h2g2's Edited Guide, every one of which is an original work. For comparison, Wikipedia
Wikipedia
Wikipedia is a free, web-based, collaborative, multilingual encyclopedia project supported by the non-profit Wikimedia Foundation. Its 20 million articles have been written collaboratively by volunteers around the world. Almost all of its articles can be edited by anyone with access to the site,...
had 3,123 Featured Articles and 10,602 Good Articles on that day. Since Wikipedia does not allow original research, all of these were derivative works.
Peer Review
On h2g2, entries are peer reviewPeer review
Peer review is a process of self-regulation by a profession or a process of evaluation involving qualified individuals within the relevant field. Peer review methods are employed to maintain standards, improve performance and provide credibility...
ed by members of the community who feel like spending the time to read and comment. Reviewers may be specialists on the topic, but most are not and it soon becomes obvious whether the average Researcher can understand an Entry. While this has the advantage that Entries are generally written in terms that the layman
Layman
A layperson or layman is a person who is not an expert in a given field of knowledge. The term originally meant a member of the laity, i.e. a non-clergymen, but over the centuries shifted in definition....
can understand, it also means that mistakes can occasionally slip into the Edited Guide.
Once an Entry has been picked by a volunteer Scout (see below) and leaves Peer Review, a copy is made and editing rights are handed to a Sub-editor. After the Entry has its day on the Front Page of h2g2 and becomes part of the Edited Guide it can be modified or updated by its author either by requesting minor changes through the Editorial Feedback section of h2g2, or by following the Update Forum process if larger changes or a rewrite are needed. However, the author can still update the original, unedited version, which remains in the wider unedited guide. Alternatively, they may choose to delete the unedited version, so that it does not show up in search
Web search engine
A web search engine is designed to search for information on the World Wide Web and FTP servers. The search results are generally presented in a list of results often referred to as SERPS, or "search engine results pages". The information may consist of web pages, images, information and other...
results.
Sub-editing
Sub-editors, likewise, are not generally experts on the material they are editing. While it involves a degree of fact checking, sub-editing mainly involves ensuring that articles are readableReadability
Readability is the ease in which text can be read and understood. Various factors to measure readability have been used, such as "speed of perception," "perceptibility at a distance," "perceptibility in peripheral vision," "visibility," "the reflex blink technique," "rate of work" , "eye...
and conform to the h2g2 house style.
Sub-editors may discuss changes with the Researcher who wrote the Entry to make sure that they are correct in their information and written in the right manner, but this is generally at the individual sub-editor's discretion. h2g2 lacks an effective change control system, and this occasionally leads to errors creeping in at this stage.
Update Forum
To keep Edited Entries up-to-date, h2g2 has a formal update system. This consists of the Update Forum process, which allows for a new version of an existing Entry to be submitted to Peer Review. Once the update has been reviewed to a sufficient extent, the updater removes the update from Peer Review and uses the Editorial Feedback system (see below) to notify the Editors. Newly updated Edited Entries commonly gain a further appearance on the Front Page and appear in a list of recently updated Entries.Editorial Feedback
Smaller changes to Edited Entries can be made by posting to the Editorial Feedback page, where the Editors and the Curators (a volunteer group) will attend to them. This can include typos, minor errors, and other small changes. It can also include the addition of extra information:Edited Guide Writing Workshop
If an article is not yet ready for submission to Peer Review, there exists an Edited Guide Writing Workshop (EGWW), where other researchers can post suggestions and corrections, so that the author can improve their work and bring it up to the standard required of the Edited Guide. Researchers may also use the EGWW to arrange collaborationCollaboration
Collaboration is working together to achieve a goal. It is a recursive process where two or more people or organizations work together to realize shared goals, — for example, an intriguing endeavor that is creative in nature—by sharing...
on an Entry.
Flea Market
Another review forum, the Flea Market, exists as a home for abandoned Entries. This allows other researchers to adopt orphaned Entries and submit them to Peer Review, with the original author taking partial creditCredit (creative arts)
In general, the term credit in the artistic or intellectual sense refers to an acknowledgement of those who contributed to a work, whether through ideas or in a more direct sense.-Credit in the arts:...
. Typically, an Entry is moved from Peer Review after its author leaves h2g2 (known as 'Elvising', after Elvis Presley
Elvis Presley
Elvis Aaron Presley was one of the most popular American singers of the 20th century. A cultural icon, he is widely known by the single name Elvis. He is often referred to as the "King of Rock and Roll" or simply "the King"....
's 'Elvis has left the building' tannoy announcements, which would be broadcast to fans at the end of his concerts).
Other content
The Edited Guide forms only a small part of h2g2 as a whole. Most of the site's 'cultural life' takes place in the far larger Unedited Guide, which contains, amongst other things, various clubs and societies, discussion areas, Researchers' h2g2 user pages (known as 'Personal Spaces'), and writing workshops. The Unedited Guide can also contain fiction, which as mentioned below may be submitted to the Alternative Writing Workshop.If an article does not make it through the Peer Review process, the original (unedited) Entry can still be viewed, as before, in the Unedited Guide. It can, of course, also be rewritten and submitted again at a later date.
UnderGuide
There is also an Alternative Writing Workshop, where entries that do not adhere to the Writing Guidelines can be worked on. Entries from this workshop are candidates for the UnderGuide, and may also be accepted for publication in the h2g2 Post (see below).The UnderGuide is h2g2's most ambitious attempt to bring the attention of the community to the best entries that fall outside of the Edited Guide's Writing Guidelines. The UnderGuide volunteers have a similar structure to the Edited Guide's volunteers - Miners have an equivalent role to Scouts, and Gem Polishers perform a similar task to Sub-editors (see below). Miners operate within the Alternative Writing Workshop, to comment on entries and pick them for the UnderGuide.
Volunteers
There are twelve different kinds of volunteer on the site, with varying responsibilities. Any researcher can apply to become a volunteer; if accepted, they gain a badge for their Personal Space, advertising their status as a member of that particular group. They are traditionally described in alphabetical order:- Aces are responsible for welcoming new users and assisting them in becoming active and experienced members of h2g2 (ACE is an acronym for Assistant Community Editor). No statistics are publicly available, but this approach ensures that a large proportion of initially active Researchers continue to contribute. Aces are also expected to take a responsible role within the community, encouraging discussion and debate.
- Aviators create audiovisual (AV) content for h2g2. Video clips have been produced to accompany Edited Guide entries, and both video and audio content have been produced to accompany articles in The Post. The Aviators host their material on an external site, h2g2aviators.com.
- Community Artists contribute the art that illustrates entries. The volunteer group provides graphics frequently to meet the requirement for a photo or illustration for one new Edited Entry each weekday. Artists are always credited on the pages they have illustrated.
- Curators are responsible Researchers who have demonstrated a long-term commitment to the Edited Guide. They have been granted the power to edit Entries in the Edited Guide. They work with the Italics to keep the Edited Guide tidy and up-to-date. Their duties include correcting typos which have slipped through the editing process, cross-linking newer Entries to older ones and removing broken links, and taking care of requests for minor changes which have been posted to the Editorial Feedback forum.
- Gurus help Researchers with technical issues, such as with GuideMLGuideMLGuideML is a document markup language used on h2g2, and other bbc.co.uk communities that use the same "DNA" software.GuideML is an application of XML standards. It mostly consists of a safe subset of XHTML with some extra tags for specific features of the software...
, a custom markup language designed to allow additional features (such as formatting for headings and subheadings, and graphical emoticonEmoticonAn emoticon is a facial expression pictorially represented by punctuation and letters, usually to express a writer’s mood. Emoticons are often used to alert a responder to the tenor or temper of a statement, and can change and improve interpretation of plain text. The word is a portmanteau word...
s), whilst removing unwanted HTMLHTMLHyperText Markup Language is the predominant markup language for web pages. HTML elements are the basic building-blocks of webpages....
tags (such as JavaScriptJavaScriptJavaScript is a prototype-based scripting language that is dynamic, weakly typed and has first-class functions. It is a multi-paradigm language, supporting object-oriented, imperative, and functional programming styles....
and embedded images and sounds). - Photographers work to provide photographs mainly for older Edited Entries, although researchers submitting entries through Peer Review can alert the photographers to the new entry and request a suitable photograph be added. All photographs supplied by the photographers must be entirely their own work, i.e. not sourced from elsewhere on the web.
- Post Reporters are those Researchers who have contributed regularly to h2g2's The Post (see below).
- Scavengers are those Researchers who have 'rescued' at least five entries from the Flea Market (see above) and used them to produce Edited Entries.
- Scouts are responsible for the running of Peer Review, and make sure that quality work does not languish there for too long. They keep an eye open for entries that have received a favourable response from other Researchers, and recommend two or three entries each month for inclusion in the Edited Guide. The picks are reviewed by the in-house team and then forwarded to a Sub-editor.
- Sub-editors check and edit Entries to be added to the Edited Guide. Once they have finished working on an entry, they submit it for a final check by the in-house team, following which the Edited Entry is posted to the front page for a day. The Sub-editors were h2g2's first volunteers, were originally hand picked, and used to do the jobs of scouts as well as sub-editing prior to the creation of Peer Review.
- University Field Researchers are Researchers who write groups of entries based around a common theme, aiming to provide a comprehensive guide to a specific subject. These projects often become quite involved and may take months to complete. Once finished, the projects are usually featured on the h2g2 home page for a whole weekend.
- UnderGuide volunteers are responsible for the running of the UnderGuide, and include Miners and Gem Polishers. Miners are analogous to Scouts in that they recommend material from the Alternative Writing Workshop (see above); Gem Polishers are analogous to Sub-editors and are responsible for sub-editing material for inclusion in the UnderGuide.
Community
The bulk of site activity takes place in the United KingdomUnited Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
(GMT/BST
British Summer Time
Western European Summer Time is a summer daylight saving time scheme, 1 hour ahead of Coordinated Universal Time. It is used in the following places:* the Canary Islands* Portugal * Ireland...
) daytime, which is when the in-house London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
based team (known as 'The Italics', see below), is there. But at other times, the US
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
, Canadian
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
and Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
n researchers are also very active.
Italics
The Italics (technically 'the Editors'), the in-house editorEditing
Editing is the process of selecting and preparing written, visual, audible, and film media used to convey information through the processes of correction, condensation, organization, and other modifications performed with an intention of producing a correct, consistent, accurate, and complete...
s of h2g2, are the only people who are paid) to work on the site. They monitor the content of the Edited Guide and oversee the general development of community life. They are named for the way their names appear in conversation threads, in bold italics, to keep people from impersonating them. There are other informal nicknames for the editors such as 'The Powers That Be', 'The Towers', 'The Powers in the Towers' and 'Pisa
Leaning Tower of Pisa
The Leaning Tower of Pisa or simply the Tower of Pisa is the campanile, or freestanding bell tower, of the cathedral of the Italian city of Pisa...
People' (again, after the slanting nature of their on-screen nicknames).
The core personnel have completely changed since h2g2 started in 1999; since 2010, none of the original TDV
The Digital Village
The Digital Village was a digital media company based inCovent Garden, London WC2 in the United Kingdom. It was founded in 1994. The science fiction/comedy writer Douglas Adams was one of the founding members, along with Robbie Stamp, who is the Executive Producer of the Hitchhiker's Guide to the...
team have worked on the site.
Clubs and societies
h2g2 is large enough to have numerous unofficial clubClub
A club is an association of two or more people united by a common interest or goal. A service club, for example, exists for voluntary or charitable activities; there are clubs devoted to hobbies and sports, social activities clubs, political and religious clubs, and so forth.- History...
s and societies, set up and maintained by Researchers. Examples include:
- The Musicians' Guild - a place for musicians to gather and discuss musical topics.
- The Zaphodistas - Loosely based on MexicoMexicoThe United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...
's ZapatistaZapatista Army of National LiberationThe Zapatista Army of National Liberation is a revolutionary leftist group based in Chiapas, the southernmost state of Mexico....
rebels, but named after Zaphod BeeblebroxZaphod BeeblebroxZaphod Beeblebrox is a fictional character in the various versions of the humorous science fiction story The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams who based him on his Cambridge contemporary, Johnny Simpson....
, the Zaphodistas campaigned for researcher rights, for example, to include external images on h2g2 pages. - The Freedom from Faith Foundation - An organization of free-thinkers, the FFFF is a forum for non-dogmatic discussion of philosophicalPhilosophyPhilosophy is the study of general and fundamental problems, such as those connected with existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language. Philosophy is distinguished from other ways of addressing such problems by its critical, generally systematic approach and its reliance on rational...
and religiousReligionReligion is a collection of cultural systems, belief systems, and worldviews that establishes symbols that relate humanity to spirituality and, sometimes, to moral values. Many religions have narratives, symbols, traditions and sacred histories that are intended to give meaning to life or to...
issues. - The Society for the Addition of a Towel Smiley - This is a group that campaigned successfully to have a graphic representing a towelTowelA towel is a piece of absorbent fabric or paper used for drying or wiping. It draws moisture through direct contact, often using a blotting or a rubbing motion. Common household textile towels are made from cotton, rayon, bamboo, nonwoven fibers or a few other materials.-Types of towels:* A bath...
added to the extensive list of h2g2 smileySmileyA smiley, smiley face, or happy face, is a stylized representation of a smiling human face, commonly occurring in popular culture. It is commonly represented as a yellow circle with two black dots representing eyes and a black arc representing the mouth...
s. - The Thingites - a group that began as a campaign for Thursday, a day that they find particularly woeful, to be renamed 'Thing'. They have since broadened their scope and now aim to have the days of the week renamed in their entirety. One of the group's threads, 'No no!!', reached 96,500 posts during December 2009.
- United Friends of h2g2space - One of the largest clubs at the site, United Friends is simply a celebration of the friendliness of h2g2.
Talk forums
Among the most popular Talk Forums on the site are:- Ask the h2g2 Community - usually abbreviated to Ask. This is a general forum where Researchers can ask members of the community questions on various subjects. It also contains long-running conversations such as "My penis and I - what do women think of penises?", "What Films have you seen recently?" and "(The Return of) What book are you reading at this time?".
- The Forum - The Forum contains similar conversations to Ask, but they tend to be of a more serious nature.
- SEx - Science Explained Forum - an area for Researchers to discuss scientific matters. Researchers are often experts in particular fields and are able to provide explanations on a broad range of subjects.
- The Quite Interesting Society - an area where Researchers can ask questions after the style of the TV quiz showQuiz ShowQuiz Show is a 1994 American historical drama film produced and directed by Robert Redford. Adapted by Paul Attanasio from Richard Goodwin's memoir Remembering America, the film is based upon the Twenty One quiz show scandal of the 1950s...
, QIQIQI is a British comedy panel game television quiz show created and co-produced by John Lloyd, hosted by Stephen Fry, and featuring permanent panellist Alan Davies. Most of the questions are extremely obscure, making it unlikely that the correct answer will be given...
.
- Miscellaneous Chat - an area devoted to conversations about anything and everything, including the odd 'last post wins' thread.
- Lil's Atelier - often home to h2g2's busiest conversation, the Atelier features both polite discussion and a degree of role-play.
The Post
The Post is h2g2's own virtual broadsheet newspaperBroadsheet
Broadsheet is the largest of the various newspaper formats and is characterized by long vertical pages . The term derives from types of popular prints usually just of a single sheet, sold on the streets and containing various types of material, from ballads to political satire. The first broadsheet...
, published weekly by a team of community members. It includes cartoons, regular columns, fiction, poetry and feature stories written and submitted by the h2g2 Researchers. It is edited by dedicated h2g2 Researchers, not paid in-house editors. The Post provides an outlet for comment and for sharing experiences, and often features content that is not intended to form a part of the Edited Guide.
Skins
h2g2 has different skinsSkin (computing)
In computing, a skin is a custom graphical appearance achieved by the use of a graphical user interface that can be applied to specific software and websites to suit the purpose, topic, or tastes of different users....
that may be used to view the site. Users can set a preference to view the site in one or other of the skins when they are logged in.
- Classic Goo was the first skin. It has large white text on a blue background.
- Alabaster was the second skin. It features small black text on a white background with chunks of orange and green.
- Brunel is the newest official skin, and consequently it is the default format for visitors who are not logged in. It has black text on white backgrounds. The border colours vary depending on what type of Entry is being viewed, and can be determined by creators of Entries by using special GuideMLGuideMLGuideML is a document markup language used on h2g2, and other bbc.co.uk communities that use the same "DNA" software.GuideML is an application of XML standards. It mostly consists of a safe subset of XHTML with some extra tags for specific features of the software...
tags; the h2g2 Front Page in Brunel changes its colour scheme with its content. - Plain was designed for Digibox, Palm and Pocket PCPocket PCA Pocket PC is also known by Microsoft as a 'Windows Mobile Classic device'. It is a hardware specification for a handheld-sized computer, personal digital assistant , that runs the Microsoft 'Windows Mobile Classic' operating system...
users who cannot load the graphic-laden alabaster, brunel or classic skins. It consists of a white background with minimal graphics. - pda is intended for mobile phones and pdaPersonal digital assistantA personal digital assistant , also known as a palmtop computer, or personal data assistant, is a mobile device that functions as a personal information manager. Current PDAs often have the ability to connect to the Internet...
s on the mobile internet. This skin contains the Edited Guide, the Search function and a page noting that the BBC does not charge for use of the mobile site, but phone companies may do. The skin is graphic-light and articles are cut into sections at headers so that only the desired content may be downloaded. The pda skin does not allow registration with the site, and does not contain unedited entries or conversation fora. - Barlesque was released as part of the site redesign in early 2011. Not strictly a skin, it was not popular and did not make the transition when the site left the BBC and is therefore no longer available.
Site redesign
The site was recently redesigned by Aerian Studios, and was launched in 2011, bringing it in line with the general appearance BBCBBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
sites, while maintaining a degree of the site's old character.
Terms and conditions
To contribute to the site it is necessary to register and to agree to the h2g2 "House Rules" and the general Not Panicking Ltd Terms and Conditions. Registered users are called Researchers. Researchers retain the copyrightCopyright
Copyright is a legal concept, enacted by most governments, giving the creator of an original work exclusive rights to it, usually for a limited time...
to their articles, but grant Not Panicking Ltd a non-exclusive license to reproduce their work in all formats.
The House Rules prohibit various things, including racism
Racism
Racism is the belief that inherent different traits in human racial groups justify discrimination. In the modern English language, the term "racism" is used predominantly as a pejorative epithet. It is applied especially to the practice or advocacy of racial discrimination of a pernicious nature...
, "hard-core" swearing
Profanity
Profanity is a show of disrespect, or a desecration or debasement of someone or something. Profanity can take the form of words, expressions, gestures, or other social behaviors that are socially constructed or interpreted as insulting, rude, vulgar, obscene, desecrating, or other forms.The...
, spamming, flooding, "otherwise objectionable" material, and spitting. Codes and languages other than English
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
may only be used sparingly and with an accompanying translation
Translation
Translation is the communication of the meaning of a source-language text by means of an equivalent target-language text. Whereas interpreting undoubtedly antedates writing, translation began only after the appearance of written literature; there exist partial translations of the Sumerian Epic of...
. The Terms and Conditions are more legalistic, and prohibit breach of copyright and defamatory material.
When the site became part of BBCi, the BBC insisted on moderating
Moderation
Moderation is the process of eliminating or lessening extremes. It is used to ensure normality throughout the medium on which it is being conducted...
contributions to the site soon after they were made. However, they were eventually persuaded that the h2g2 Community could be trusted to a system of "reactive moderation", in which posts were not checked by moderators unless a complaint was made. On leaving the BBC, the moderation guidelines under Not Panicking Ltd have remained much the same. Individual user accounts are sometimes put on "pre-moderation", meaning that posts they make are not displayed until they have been reviewed by a moderator.
During their time with the BBC, particularly contentious major issues often led to discussion being moderated differently. For example:
- Political Discussions during Elections in the United KingdomElections in the United KingdomThere are five types of elections in the United Kingdom: United Kingdom general elections, elections to devolved parliaments and assemblies, elections to the European Parliament, local elections and mayoral elections. Elections are held on Election Day, which is conventionally a Thursday...
were restricted to specific forums. These forums had posts read by moderators to ensure that the BBC could not be seen to break the tight rules that govern the UK media during such elections. - During the 2001 invasion of AfghanistanWar in Afghanistan (2001–present)The War in Afghanistan began on October 7, 2001, as the armed forces of the United States of America, the United Kingdom, Australia, and the Afghan United Front launched Operation Enduring Freedom...
, extra rules were put in place. - On 17 March 2003, h2g2 issued guidelines for discussions during the 2003 Iraq war2003 invasion of IraqThe 2003 invasion of Iraq , was the start of the conflict known as the Iraq War, or Operation Iraqi Freedom, in which a combined force of troops from the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia and Poland invaded Iraq and toppled the regime of Saddam Hussein in 21 days of major combat operations...
, including a statement that "All new postings and articles relating to the conflict in Iraq posted to h2g2 will now be failed". This policy was lifted on 24 April 2003.
Occasionally, more contentious Entries submitted for review are hidden pending moderation, with two articles about the Nestlé boycott
Nestlé boycott
The Nestlé boycott is a boycott launched on July 7, 1977, in the United States against the Swiss-based Nestlé corporation. It spread quickly throughout the United States, and expanded into Europe in the early 1980s. In Canada, the controversy lasted from 1978 to 1984...
having been pulled in the past.
DNA
The software for h2g2 - and of its related 'sister' communities in the BBC (now all closed), such as "606", "Film Network", "Action Network", "Comedy Soup", "Memoryshare" and "Collective" – is affectionately known as DNA, after the initials of author and site founder Douglas Noel AdamsDouglas Adams
Douglas Noel Adams was an English writer and dramatist. He is best known as the author of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, which started life in 1978 as a BBC radio comedy before developing into a "trilogy" of five books that sold over 15 million copies in his lifetime, a television...
. The DNA technology was introduced a few months after the BBC takeover and is still used for BBC blogs, messageboards and commenting systems. Before this technology, there was "Ripley", which was named after the character
Ellen Ripley
Ellen Ripley is a fictional character and the main protagonist of the Alien film series played by American actress Sigourney Weaver. The character was heralded as a seminal role for challenging gender roles, particularly in the science fiction genre, and remains Weaver's most famous role to...
from the film Aliens
Aliens (film)
Aliens is a 1986 science fiction action film directed by James Cameron and starring Sigourney Weaver, Carrie Henn, Michael Biehn, Lance Henriksen, William Hope, and Bill Paxton...
, in homage to the quote "I say we take off and nuke the entire site from orbit. It's the only way to be sure." Before that there was a technology with no particular name, which subsequently gained the retronym
Retronym
A retronym is a type of neologism that provides a new name for an object or concept to differentiate the original form or version of it from a more recent form or version. The original name is most often augmented with an adjective to account for later developments of the object or concept itself...
Llama, due to the code holding the site together being written mostly in Perl
Perl
Perl is a high-level, general-purpose, interpreted, dynamic programming language. Perl was originally developed by Larry Wall in 1987 as a general-purpose Unix scripting language to make report processing easier. Since then, it has undergone many changes and revisions and become widely popular...
, the standard introductory textbook for which, Learning Perl
Learning Perl
Learning Perl, also known as the llama book, is a tutorial book for the Perl programming language, and is published by O'Reilly. It was authored solely by Randal L. Schwartz in its first edition . The second edition was coauthored with Tom Christiansen and the third edition was coauthored with...
, has a picture of a llama
Llama
The llama is a South American camelid, widely used as a meat and pack animal by Andean cultures since pre-Hispanic times....
on the front cover.
Adams himself was rather involved in the website in its early days. His account name was DNA, and his user number was 42, a reference to the famous joke in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is a science fiction comedy series created by Douglas Adams. Originally a radio comedy broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in 1978, it was later adapted to other formats, and over several years it gradually became an international multi-media phenomenon...
that the Answer to the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything is 42. When Adams died in May 2001, his personal space was the focus for a huge reaction from the community. Adams' legacy is still felt on h2g2, and naturally the site is peppered with references to the Hitchhiker books; it is, however, not a fan site, and was never intended as such.
See also
- CollectiveCollective (BBC)Collective was an "interactive culture magazine" hosted by the BBC's website, bbc.co.uk. Collective was launched in May 2002, becoming interactive in September of the same year. Collective editors included Rowan Kerek, Jonathan Carter, Alastair Lee, James Cowdery and Matt Walton who had the...
- List of online encyclopedias