The following manifesto was created by Robbie Stamp and core members of the H2G2 community:
Manifesto
> The idea was fantastically, wildly improbable. But like most fantastically wildly improbable ideas it was at least as worthy of consideration as a more mundane one to which the facts have been strenuously bent to fit. > > Douglas Adams
## A Manifesto
We, the Researchers of h2g2.com, the Earth Edition of that wholly remarkable guidebook to the meaning of Life, the Universe, and Everything known as *The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy*, can look back with some pride on the last 25 years.
We can do this because we accomplished some pretty cool things, such as amassing quite a lot of Guide Entries, publishing ten books, and connecting quite a few people around the planet.
We can also do this because we're a bunch of dewy-eyed optimists with a 'never say die' attitude. We never say 'die' because we're charter members of the Anti-Entropy League and besides, it's such an unpleasant word.
As we approach our next quarter-century, which we hope will be even more replete with excitement, adventure, and bizarre things to write about, we've sat down and had a good collective think. We've looked at ourselves, the planet, and the internet. And we've come to a conclusion.
Over the past quarter-century, we've seen the internet evolve in ways we like and some we don't like. This scenario is all too familiar: it happens again and again when there's innovation. The big companies just keep getting bigger. Individuals become 'users' who matter less and less.
Back in the 19th century, some people found a way around the sheer power of the big companies by forming 'mutual societies' – they used the power of membership with lots of individuals having some skin in the game as a way of reclaiming agency. We want to do that.
But we need your help.
Our biggest strength lies in what we are that the modern business climate is not. Instead of giant corporations with toxic business models based on selling our data over our heads, we remain dewy-eyed (but now experienced and dewy-eyed) and want to build on the principles that made the internet a bold, new frontier in the first place.
## The Story So Far
In the unchartered backwaters of the unfashionable end of the internet, lies a small, precious website, based on a unique global legacy and a unique set of intellectual property rights.
In April 1999 – before Facebook, Twitter, Twitch, or Tik Tok, before even Wikipedia, more or less of the same vintage as Google and back in a dial-up world (yes, really, we're talking ancient history) – the late, great Douglas Adams launched *The Earth Edition of the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy* live on *Tomorrow's World* on the BBC in London.
Improbably, h2g2.com is still going 25 years later. Its original vision is still being pursued by an extraordinary group of Field Researchers, who have quietly continued to work away on a site held together by love and sticking plaster.
The reason for the sticking plaster is also the reason h2g2 is special. h2g2 doesn't belong to a giant corporation. Sirius Cybernetics owns no piece of us. Nobody farms *our* data, thank you very much.
- H2G2 Looks Ahead to the Next Quarter-Century
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# Next steps - Where Are We Now? - What Are Our Goals? - General Notes for a Small Planet - Informing and Having Fun
# Baby steps Our first baby steps are to: 1. Idea Mine this Manifesto 1. Form a Federated Writing Group 1. Interview H2G2 members 1. Organise regular Creatathons