Call Board Community Standards

[PSMKay]

Welcome!

If you're new to our community, jump right in. If you're an "old-timer," please greet newcomers and help them feel at home. This community is here for all of us, and we want it to be comfortable, thought provoking, helpful, safe, and easy to use.

The Call Board Admin is PSMKay (kscleaves at smnetwork dot org). The Call Board Admin is responsible for background coding and all final decisions pertaining to SMNetwork.org.  Our staff list can be viewed on the staff page. Moderators have the ability to Edit, Delete, or Modify any post to their designated Call Board Forum.  You can email or Private Message the Admin or Moderators any time you have a question or concern.

As a reminder:

• Opinions, not facts: Items on SMNetwork are generally other users' opinions. The Call Board is not responsible for the accuracy of any posts and is not liable for any damage or loss that may result from your reliance on what other users have said.
• Privacy: You acknowledge that all Call Board communications, including chat and bulletin board posts, are public and not private communications. You grant SMNetwork the right to modify and publish, both on our site and in other media, any information you post in our community areas.
• Right to Terminate: You agree that The Call Board has the right to delete any post and terminate any account (that is, ban a user) with or without notice, at any time and for any reason, including, without limitation, our judgment that you've violated the Community Standards. You also acknowledge that we have no obligation to delete content that you find personally objectionable or offensive.

Online Safety

• Never provide your password, telephone numbers, or home address to anyone online. Be very careful about responding to solicitations for interviews or research (unless invited to do so by a SMNetwork staff member). Give out your e-mail address only if you want to receive e-mail. If you post your e-mail address on the site (on boards or in chats), you've made it public and given other users tacit permission to contact you.
• Never divulge private information about another user online. That includes the user's real name, e-mail address, and any other personal information that the user has not made public. Don't forward or post private messages that someone has sent you unless you have his or her permission. Only send e-mail to another Call Board member if they have given you permission. Please don't solicit other people's personal information.
• If you're looking for subjects to interview or participants for a study, please first contact the Call Board Admin for permission.

Copyrights
Please don't post anything you don't have the right to publish or violate any copyright or other proprietary rights in your posts. That includes excerpting published articles without the author's permission. We'll delete posts that contain any such violations.
Edit, Mar 25 2009:
Uploaded forms have their own guidelines in the interest of intellectual property management.  For guidelines regarding uploaded attachments, please refer to this post on the Uploaded Forms board.

Usernames

Choose a username that's in good taste. If you select a username we deem vulgar or obscene or misrepresents you to other users, we'll reject your choice. Anyone who tries to impersonate an SMNetwork staff member or another user will be banned immediately and without notice.

Basic etiquette

Please don't do any of the following:

• Use all capital letters in your chat or bulletin board postings. It's considered "shouting" online, makes other members uncomfortable, and is difficult to read.
• Post the same message more than once on a bulletin board or on multiple boards. This includes postings on multiple boards asking other users to vote in online contests.
• Transfer issues or posts from one bulletin board to another. Don't quote someone else's post from another board without that person's permission. A lot of misunderstanding and hurt can ensue when a post from one place is taken out of context and shared with others. Please don't direct people to controversial or problematic threads on other boards.
• "Drive By Posting." Please consider what you post before posting it. Does your post contribute to the conversation? Does it say anything other than a "Me too" or "Not me"? We strongly discourage posts without useful content on the Call Board.  If you wish to simply show your support for a fellow poster, we suggest sending them a PM.
• Write your entire post in colored text.  This board has multiple color schemes with multiple background colors. The default font color allows for these variations.  Colored text used by posters does not and can become illegible when the background changes.  The color options are there for emphasis only.
• Add a poll to a post if you're not seeking statistical information.  Totally unnecessary polls will be removed by the moderators and your posting rights may be removed temporarily.

Unacceptable language

Please don't post anything obscene, vulgar, illegal (including viruses), harmful, insulting, threatening, abusive, harassing, defamatory, libelous, or invasive of someone else's privacy. We won't tolerate hateful communications — especially those targeting race, gender, age, sexual orientation, religion, national origin, weight, or disability. Using asterisks or other symbols instead of the actual letters in an offensive word is not okay if most people can still tell what you're saying. If you're not sure which words are forbidden, send an e-mail to one of the Moderators. Some examples:

What's okay: "My #%$&* mother-in-law is driving me nuts!" (where the symbols indicate strong feeling and maybe the urge to use a swear word, but don't suggest any specific word).

What's not okay: a$$hole, etc.

Personal attacks

Harassing another community member is never acceptable, even on the most lively debate boards. A personal attack includes name-calling, mocking a user or a user's name or family members, using threatening or insulting language, or violating another user's privacy. Exercise some common sense here. If you wouldn't have the nerve to say it in person, don't post it. If you can't draw the line, we'll draw it for you, but we'd rather not have to. Some examples:

What's okay: "I can't agree with that opinion. It's this kind of thinking that's sending union contracts down the tubes!" Strong disagreement with someone's point of view, not a comment on the individual poster.

What's not okay: "Why did you ever go into stage management? You really don't have the disposition for it if you publish things like that!" An uncalled-for personal attack.

You're free to discuss your personal views in our community. But please don't attack the beliefs and life choices of others as wrong or misguided, or tell others what they should believe or how they should live. For example, if you are of one faith, please don't try to tell other members that their beliefs or choices are wrong and that they should follow your faith instead. Posts like this constitute personal attacks, and we'll delete them.

Advertising and solicitations

Don't use any community areas to advertise or sell products or services to others. For example:

• Please don't post (on boards or in chats) any advertising, promotional materials, junkmail, "spam," chain letters, pyramid schemes, or any other form of solicitation.
• Please don't post on multiple boards asking users to vote for you in online contests or polls (such as "cute baby" contests).

Mentioning other Web sites

It's perfectly okay to mention, link to, or discuss other Web sites that are of interest to our users, as long as they don't violate our other guidelines. But please don't use our message boards simply to generate traffic for a website. If you would like to advertise your personal website etc., please include the URL in your profile.

Pruning and Deleting Threads

As threads become unwieldy when they get too long, threads will be locked without exception if they get to be longer than 10 pages.  If you wish to continue a thread after it has been locked, you may start a new one.

If you wish for a thread to be excepted from the automatic pruning function, please contact a Moderator or Admin with your request.

On Legal Advice

Discussions of matters such as contracts and union regulations/rules are provided as friendly suggestions only.  On the whole, SMNetwork members are not attorney, lawyers, or union employees.  All suggestions are provided as a courtesy and not as a mandate.  While members are welcome to post and debate about such matters, we claim no liability for the advice given and suggest both use of discretion and contact with professionals who regularly handle such issues before taking action based on SMNetwork postings.

Contacting us

We are only an e-mail or Private Message away if you have any concerns you'd like us to address. Please contact us in order to:

• Report a concern about something in our chat areas.
• Get help navigating the site or participating in our community.
• Get clarification of these guidelines or any other aspect of our community.
• Alert us to a violation of these guidelines.
• Report any concern you have about our community.

The Community Standards are adapted from the excellent version at The Sluggite Zone.