The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy - a minor mystery solved

A couple of years ago I asked this question, based on a dimly remembered name from THHGTTG, about whether the Guide had originally been invented by someone named Web. I thought it was a neat coincidence, if true.

Well, as I recently got hold of the DVD of the 1980s BBC TV series, I can report that I was almost right. In the graphics sequence in episode (I think) 5, relating facts about the universe (8 ningis = 1 Triganic pu, etc.), there’s a brief drawing of the editor of the Guide, who goes by the name Web Nixo.

That’s all.

Second cousin to Kit Fisto.

and Kam Fong as Chin Ho!

Hah! fiddly small change.

It really is amazing that the guide seemed like such a neat but unlikely device a quarter-century ago.

Now we can see it for what it is: A Wi-Fi enabled PDA.

But these days we can see that roving researchers such as Ford Prefect would hardly be necessary – surely the Guide would work better as a wiki? :wink:

It would fit perfectly with the guide’s inaccuracies and its policy of ‘when the guide disagrees with reality, it’s reality that has got it wrong.’ :smiley:

I remember at first reading being utterly flummoxed as to what an “electronic book” could possibly be. The idea of a viewscreen never occurred to me, as a book has to have pages, right? The best I could visualize was a few plastic sheets that print would scroll up like the Star Wars opening blurb, sandwiched in between two stiffer plastic sheets, with the whole shebang tucked into a case like the boxlike pressboard case my copy of Little Women came in. And I could never work out where the buttons came in.

In my defense, I was 10.

And I didn’t “get” Eccentria Gallumbits, either! :smiley:

This would be the precursor to Truthiness, wouldn’t it?

My PDA doesn’t speak in Stephen Fry’s voice /pout/.

You could get one that does, can’t you? Maybe not today, but surely in a few more years.

Everyone knows the real guide is voiced by Peter Jones. :cool:

That sounds an awful lot like electronic paper

In the meantime, the Jeeves clock! (Caution: Sound)

I was about 18 when I first read the books and listened to the radio series (1981?) and the visual image I formulated of the Guide was like an over-sized calculator with a large screen, so I suppose I wasn’t too far off.

Not really, you might need the reporters to cover the lesser known areas of space, like earth, that practicaly no one goes to.

I had one of those scientific calculators with the big screen and a plastic cover that slid over the top. Of course, I drew the DON’T PANIC logo on the cover in Biro.

Thank you for this. I admire Jeeves (and Stephen Fry’s interpretation of him) enormously. O for my own “gentleman’s gentleman”!

Actually the precursor of Wikiality.

Oh, my god. I want this so badly.

I’m waiting for the ‘madame’ version in May. I can’t imagine what it will cost to have it shipped to Canada but it will be worth it!