Line #12 Website/H2G2

Context Website / H2G2

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1	Back in 1999, Creator/DouglasAdams -- who was always quite a technophile -- decided it was about time to make a website for Franchise/TheHitchhikersGuideToTheGalaxy. He didn't want it to be a fan site, a mostly-static place with information about the Hitchhiker's series; he had [[http://h2g2.com/A550955 something much bigger]] in mind. What he wanted was, in essence, the "Earth Edition" of the Guide, somewhere where internet users could write and post their own articles about Life, the Universe and Everything, share information, create an online community; all those wonderful things that the World Wide Web made possible. (As well as some things that he imagined would be possible in the near future, such as the use of "devices [...] that combine palmtop computers with cellphones with Internet devices with GPS systems".) So that's what he did.
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3	If it had been created today, it would have been called UsefulNotes/WebTwoPointOh (and maybe, "yet another wiki site"). Back then, it was called h2g2. It predated Website/{{Wikipedia}}, its more popular alternative, by two years. For all intents and purposes, Adams invented the Wiki. It can still be found [[http://h2g2.com here]].
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5	The site almost went down when the dot-com bubble burst, but was acquired by Creator/TheBBC, who kept it going for another decade or so, until a reorganization of the BBC sites left h2g2 out of the picture. It is currently being run by the Community Consortium, who bought it from BBC.
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8	!! This site provides examples of:
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10	* AcronymAndAbbreviationOverload: "h2g2" is the fan-accepted abbreviation for ''The Hitch-Hiker's Guide To The Galaxy''. (two "h"'s, two "g"'s). This is a lot simpler and easier than typing ''The Hitch-Hiker's Guide To The Galaxy'' on each and every occurence. This only appears to be accepted in a limited sort of way on tvtropes, however...
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12	* CreatorsCultureCarryover: Douglas Adams was British. The BBC is British. Most (though by no means all) users of h2g2 are British. Is it a surprise if h2g2 sometimes feels a bit... well... British?
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14	%%* GreatBigBookOfEverything: Douglas Adams's aim in setting up h2g2.
15	* {{Homage}}: Most Hootooers have been assigned six, seven, or even eight digit user numbers in the format U538194. Douglas Adams could only be assigned one Researcher Number. His was, and ever more will remain, U42.
16	* SavingTheOrphanage: In 2010, BBC announced they were reorganizing their sites, and h2g2 was going to be "disposed of". Much consternation arised, but the community banded together, created a Consortium, found some investors, and managed to buy the site and move it to an independent domain.
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Context Website / H2G2