A.1. Preface
These are the Frequently Asked Questions (and their answers) for the newsgroup alt.fan.douglas-adams. There is biographical information about Douglas Adams, answers to the frequently asked questions that plague the group, interesting notes and titbits that you may (or may not) have known, and anything else that I and readers of the group have found interesting.
This FAQ is possible only through the support of the DNA fans around the world, mostly but not limited to the readers of alt.fan.douglas-adams, and the members of ZZ9 Plural Z Alpha. Without their help, this document would be pretty skimpy indeed. It's sadly been impossible to maintain the names and originators of all the information found in this document, thanks to its sometimes unexpected progression. So accept this global thanks to all the contributors. As usual, any info you think pertinant, interesting, enjoyable, etc. that you think deserves a spot in this FAQ, send along to either Greg, Owen or Stuart (stuart@atomiser.demon.co.uk).
Where possible, pointers to existing information (such as books, magazine articles, and FTP sites) are included here, rather than rehashing that information again. Information is provided without guarantee- if you get stung using any of the information provided here, or send off your personal fortune and are stuck, then I accept no blame or responsibility. It's your own damn fault.
If you haven't already done so, now is as good a time as any to read the guide to Net etiquette which is posted to news.announce.newusers regularly. You should be familiar with acronyms like FAQ, FTP and IMHO, as well as know about smileys, followups and when to reply by email to postings.
The questions list for this FAQ will be posted to news.answers and alt.fan.douglas-adams. All posts to news.answers are archived, and it is possible to retrieve the last posted copy via anonymous FTP from here. Contributions, comments and changes for this FAQ should be sent to either Owen, Greg or Stuart (stuart@atomiser.demon.co.uk). Alternatively a post to alt.fan.douglas-adams might be best.
The FAQ was initially compiled by David Polak, continued by Nathan Torkington (neither David Polak or Nathan Torkington's e-mail addresses are guaranteed to be current), the baton shifted to Nathan Hughes, and carried on assisted into HTML and to its current home on the Web by Stuart Bruce.
Thanks are also due to Richard Harris, Tim Browse and Yoz Grahame (and more) of The Digital Village for their attempts to keep us up to date. Also, to Owen Cameron, Andrew Williams, Evan Macbeth, MJ Simpson, and everyone else on alt.fan.douglas-adams who has assisted.
If you cannot find the answer to your question(s) within the whole of this FAQ, or any of the sources listed below, you might like to try posting a query to the alt.fan.douglas-adams newsgroup. We're usually a helpful, if silly, bunch of various species.
If the query is of a personal or very unusual nature, you could write to the 'ask Douglas Adams' e-mail address. See B.3.1. What's Douglas Adams' e-mail address?
There is also a German edition of "Don't Panic" called "Keine Panik", listed here.
Before asking questions like "I simply cannot find the place where Vroomfondel makes his first appearance in Hitch Hiker's Guide..., can someone help me?" in the newsgroup, please take a look at The Ultra-Complete Index to the Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy or, if your question refers to one of the Dirk Gently books, The Ultra-Complete Index to Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency.A.1.1. FAQ history & credits
A.2. Where can I find more information about Douglas Adams?
A.2.1. What's "Don't Panic" by Neil Gaiman?
"Don't Panic" is an essential guide to 'The Guide' for any serious fans of the Hitch Hiker's Guide To The Galaxy and Douglas Adams. Details are as follows:
Title: Don't Panic
There have been two main editions of "Don't Panic", the first entirely written by Neil Gaiman, and the second greatly improved to accomodate the publication of Mostly Harmless- although this second edition is still credited to Gaiman, the updating work was done either entirely, or almost entirely, by David K. Dickson.
Subtitle: Douglas Adams & the Hitch Hiker's Guide To The Galaxy
Author: Neil Gaiman with additional material by David K. Dickson
Publisher: Titan Books Ltd, 19 Valentine Place, London SE1 8HQ
Pages: 225
ISBN: 1-85286-411-7
Price: £4.99 in the UK (formerly £3.99)
A.2.2. Information from ZZ9 Plural Z Alpha
ZZ9 Plural Z Alpha are the official Hitch Hiker's Guide To The Galaxy Appreciation Society. Their Web homepage is situated here. See also Section Z.
A.3. The Ultra-Complete Indices