Possible new forum rules

[Mystara]

Howdy all,

Over the last few weeks, the moderators have been discussing a set of forum/site rules.

Up until now, we've felt that things are a little bit too ad-hoc here and although almost everyone behaves, we get the occasional user that is just a little too hard to decide what to do with.

We also feel that the forum would benefit from setting out some requests that we'd like to make, to try and help keep the forum tidy

After some discussion, we have come up with the following, and would appreciate any thoughts you have. We have tried to keep the rules both short and simple.

At the same time, we propose modifying the Knewbie/regular user system to being more human-controlled. Rather than the current system, which requires a certain number of posts to be made before losing Knewbie status, a moderator would remove the status when they are convinced that the user is genuine. We expect this would occur after most users' first post.

Rules

• No unsolicited advertising. If you genuinely believe that a product or service is likely to be of interest to the community, it should be submitted to the main site. It should not be posted to the forum (via a post or a signature).

• No harassing, disruptive or abusive behaviour. This is an open community in which people should be able to freely contribute without bullying.

• No duplicate accounts. One account per person. If you are having trouble logging into your account, contact the administrators for help (unless you've been banned, in which case, we'd rather you didn't).

Requests

• Start a new thread wherever possible

• Be clear and specific in your thread titles

• Keep on topic

• Post in the relevant part of the forum

• Do not solicit or request copyrighted material

• No trolling

Sanctions

• Knewbies who break the rules will have their accounts removed and all posts deleted.

• Other users will have the offending post (if any) removed and will be warned.

• 3 warnings in 3 months results in the account being permanently banned.

• Posts that fail to follow our requests are liable to be deleted or moved.

• Knowingly repeatedly failing to following our requests constitutes disruptive behaviour.

• Other sanctions may be used as and when deemed to be necessary for the good of the forum.

[pjmlfc05]

I agree with all you have said. My only gripe is with topics and sticking to them. I understand what your saying but sometimes topics or conversations goes off on a tangent. One conversation I recall is when talking about Knightmare when it was on the Old Skool weekend and i think i said I was looking forward to seeing other shows like Art Attack and Sooty.

But apart from that I think all you have mentioned is fair. Keep up the good work!

[Mystara]

People should start new threads if they find things are going off-topic. Otherwise, those people who don't read every single thread (and only look at the title) may not join in.

In general, moderators can split a topic to move all the relevant posts to the new thread.

[Mystara]

I received a message asking whether the ban on unsolicited advertising means that the posting of URLs would be prohibited.

The answer is that posting URLs would not be banned, per se. It would depend on whether (in our view) the URL was being posted for the sole purpose of advertising something that was not solicited by the community.

That said, we would discourage people from posting URLs in forum messages. If it's relevant to Knightmare, it's probably better provided to the main site.

[Mystara]

Additionally...

The "No trolling" rule is superfluous. I think trolling is simply a form of harassment.

Instead, I propose changing that rule to "post news stories to the main site"

[Mystara]

Made posting global prior to finally implementing these rules.

[Mystara]

These rules are now in effect.