New Rules go into effect 11-7

[DZComposer]

I was looking-over the rules and noticed some wording issues. Also things have happened here and on other SF boards and in the law that have made me seriously consider rewriting the rules.

Don't be alarmed, nothing is really changing. The main changes are putting into writing what were previously unwritten rules (like no religious posts, etc.).

The wording has been changed so that the rules read more like a Terms of Use document, and these rules will become the terms of use for the SFO forums that will be displayed to new users.

Please review these and make any comments/suggestions. These are not binding yet. I want community input first.

SFO Forum Rules and Terms of Use

Version 2.0.0

PLEASE READ: THIS IS NOT THE USUAL MUMBO-JUMBO

Welcome to the StarFox-Online (SFO) Forums! This forum is mainly for the discussion of Nintendo's Star Fox series, but general discussion is allowed.

Sections:

Preamble

Disclamers

Staff

Terms List

Main Posting Rules

Image Policy

Writings Policy

Signature Policy

Avatar Policy

Punishments

Locked, Deleted, Merged, and Split threads

PREAMBLE

The purpose StarFox-Online is to provide a fan-friendly, all-ages, site that contains useful and unique information about the Star Fox series while maintaining a community of fans who discuss the series as well as other topics amongst each other in a peaceful and friendly manner.

DISCLAIMERS

SFO resides in the United States of America and is subject to the laws of that country. Please note that, while this country has free speech rights, these rights only apply to public speech. SFO is a private entity, and is therefore able to impose rules restricting what may or may not be posted. If you do not like one of these rules, you have all right to not participate in this community. Do not use free speech as a justification for violating a rule.

SFO, its owners, staff, or affiliates, are not responsible for the actions, hyperlinks, or posts of it's users.

SFO will cooperate with any official, legal, investigations that require action on SFO's part.

The IP address of the Internet gateway for the computer you use will be logged for each post you make in order for certain board features to work and in case that information is needed by authorities.

SFO retains all posts for at least six months. Posts that are deleted are automatically archived in case they are needed for any reason.

You will be making up your own username and password. Keep the password secret and do not share it with ANYBODY. Not even the admins. The staff is not responsible if your account is compromised.

Please note that by posting, you are agreeing to follow these rules, which are subject to change at any time with or without notice.

STAFF

The Moderation staff, which includes Forum Administrators (“Admins”) and Moderators (“Mods”), will enforce these rules as fairly as they can.

Link to Staff Roster here

You may contact any of these people to report violations of these rules or if you have questions concerning them. You can either contact these people via Private Message (PM) or e-mail. Please provide proof when claiming someone violated a rule. You can access the profiles of the staff from the admin and mod groups pages, which are linked above.

TERMS LIST

Troll -  Someone who causes trouble for their own amusement

Considered Troll - When something is considered troll, that means that it is assumed that the post was made to cause trouble

Flamebait - A post that has high potential to start heated arguments.

Avatar - A small picture under your username

Signature (sig) - a short text message or image that follows all of your posts.

Private Message (PM) - A message sent to another user that is not shown to other users.

Spam - a post that has no purpose other than to take up space or advertise something

Shock Site -  A website with graphic content intended to disgust and/or shock the viewer. These sites often contain graphic images of sexually deviant behavior and/or death. Linking to a shock site WILL get you banned.

MAIN POSTING RULES

1. Treat others as you would like to be treated. Insults, flamebait, trolling, linking to shock sites, and racism/sexism/etc. are not allowed. Please post in a friendly manner. Do not use ad hominem [link to Wikipedia page] argument in debates.

Please note that mild profanity is allowed so long as it is not used in excess or insult.

2. Do not respond to trolls. When a troll comes around, do not respond to them. Alert the staff and let them handle it. Anyone who's actions encourage the troll to post, intentionally or otherwise, may be subject to punishment.

3. Do not advertise a product or another site or forum, even if they are related to the topic of discussion. Such posts are considered spam and may be either deleted or locked with or without warning. You may link to your site in your signature or in the “Promote your Site” thread.

4. Do not post anything with no discussion value. One word posts, l33t speak, posts intended for one person (use a PM) and such do not add to the discussion. Please do not post them. Such posts will be considered spam and may be either deleted or locked with or without warning. There is a board for silliness called “The Rec Room” which is a child board of “The Lounge.”

5. Do not post a PM in public unless everyone involved agrees to it.

6. The PM system is subject to all forum rules. PM harassment will not be tolerated.

7. No sexual content. Lewd remarks, pornography, and non-artistic nudity are not allowed and can get you banned if it is bad enough (anything that can be considered child pornography will get you instantly banned, including drawings/artist renderings). Some artistic nudity is allowed in the art forums. See the image policy for clarification.

8. Do not under any circumstance link to a shock site or post or link to an image from a shock site. This is an instant ban offense.

9.Do not post  anything illegal under the laws of the United States of America. This includes ROM dumps and disc images from commercial games, Warez, information on constructing explosives, copyrighted recordings, copyrighted text (including song lyrics), copyrighted images, terroristic behavior, anything promoting illegal substance use, or anything else in violation of the law.

Note: If a post of copyrighted material can be rationalized as fair use (by the legal definition), you may post it.

10. Discussion of politics and religion are not allowed. That includes posts that are nationalistic in nature. Do not post religious or political symbols that may be offensive to others. Also, do not promote a political party, candidate, or organization. No exceptions, including signatures and avatars.

11. Do not dredge for old topics. Check the date of the last post before replying to a thread.

12. Do not create more than one account. If you have a special reason to do this, ask an admin first.

13. Attempts to exploit software bugs, gain access to unauthorized areas, or otherwise hack SFO is a violation of US Law and charges will be pressed.

14. Please try to stay on topic within a thread.

15. Please be mindful of users with lower screen resolutions. If your post creates horizontal scrollbars, please consider revising it.

16. Any behavior or post deemed by the staff to be inappropriate or against the best interest of the community may be subject to action, up to and including post deletion and permanent ban, even if it is not explicitly in violation of these rules.

IMAGE POLICY

All images, signatures and avatars included, posted on the SFO Forums must abide by these rules.

1. No Pornography. Pornography is any image that contains non-artistic nudity or sexual acts.

2. Artistic, Tasteful, Nudity is allowed ONLY on the art boards (fanart and member works) so long as it follows these guidelines:

A. All images that contain nudity must have a warning and may not be embedded in or attached to your post. You may only link to the image in such a manner that someone browsing the boards will not accidentally see the image.

B. The subject may not appear to be underage, even if the subject technically isn't.

C. Female Nudity: The full breast may not be shown, the area of the nipple must be covered; the crotch area must be covered, regardless if something can be seen or not.

D. Male Nudity: The crotch must be covered, regardless of if something can be seen or not.

3. Clothing should not be too revealing. If a private area is obviously visible through clothing, then don't post it. With female subjects, it's fine to have a little bit of a lump where the nipple is, but it shouldn't be too obvious. Same goes with the male crotch, so long as the shape isn't obvious and it isn't too large. The staff will determine if an image shows too much.

4. Please do not post anything that suggests anything sexual or suggests the desire for a sex act.

5. Graphic depictions of death or serious bodily injury are prohibited. A small amount of blood is fine, but nothing extremely graphic.

6. Please post a warning if an image contains significant violence.

7. Do not post anything that promotes illegal activity, including substance abuse.

8.  Do not post any image that appears as if it would trigger seizure disorders. Seizures are serious medical emergencies, and are not funny. Intentionally posting such an image will be considered troll.

9. Please respect copyrights and ensure that you have permission to post the image on forums or the the post constitutes fair use.

10. If the staff deems any image to be inappropriate, it may be removed.

WRITINGS POLICY

All literary work, including stories, song lyrics and poetry, posted on the SFO Forums must abide by these rules.

1. No Pornography. Pornography is any writing that describes sexual conduct or nudity in detail.

2. Graphic descriptions of death or serious bodily injury are prohibited. A reasonable description is allowed, but if reads like the script to a slasher film, then don't post it.

3. Please post a warning if a writing contains significant violence.

4. Do not post anything that promotes illegal activity, including substance abuse.

5. Please respect copyrights and ensure that you have permission to post the writings on forums or the the post constitutes fair use.

6. If the staff deems any writing to be inappropriate, it may be removed.

SIGNATURE POLICY

1. Signatures must abide by the main posting rules.

2. Please keep the image sizes reasonable. Any image taller than 200 pixels will be removed. If your image causes a screen at 1280x1024 to require horizontal scroll bars, it will be removed. 

3. Signatures have a 300 character limit (including bbcode tags) enforced by the forum software.

4. You may not use any form of script in your signature, server-side or otherwise. This is for security reasons.

5. If a staff member tells you to change your signature, please do so. Refusal will result in an admin removing your signature.

AVATAR POLICY

1. All avatars must conform to the image policy and main forum rules.

2.Avatar sizes are to be no larger than 150W x 200H x 300kB. No exceptions. This is enforced by the forum software.

3. Your avatar may not be a script, server-side or otherwise. This is for security purposes.

4. If a staff member asks you to change your avatar, do so. Failure to do so may result in you avatar being removed.

PUNISHMENTS

If you violate a rule, one of the following will happen.

1. Warning - the most common and the most lenient. A staff member will remind you of the rule and advise you to change your behavior.

2. Locking, Deleting, or Editing of posts – Your offending posts will be locked, deleted, or edited at the staff member's discretion.

3. Temporary Ban - You won't be able to post for a few days.

4. Permanent Ban - You are permanently banned from SFO. You may not return. If you create a new account, it will be banned too.

5. Contact of Authorities -  If your action violates the law, SFO may contact the relevant authorities.

Locked, Deleted, Moved, Merged and Split threads

Threads become locked for many reasons. The staff will attempt to explain the lock as the final reply to any thread that they lock. If you restart a locked thread, it will be closely watched or re-locked, depending on reason for lock. The following Lock Codes may be used by the staff when locking:

[V, #] = Rule Violation. # represents the rule number violated.

[RD] = Redundant

[OT] = Drifted Off-Topic

[WB] = Wrong Board

[DE] = Discussion Ended. This is used when threads have served their purpose.

[OLD] = Old thread that was dredged.

[AN] = Announcement, no replies allowed.

[sD] = Staff Discretion, the thread was locked for another reason. Explained in thread.

Threads become deleted if they are too old or if they are in serious violation of a rule. Threads deleted for rule violation can't be restarted. The staff will delete them again.

Any thread that is posted in the wrong forum will be moved. A shadow topic will be left to inform people of the move. If a thread becomes something that belongs in another forum, it will also be moved.

Sometimes, though rarely, a thread will be split. This will usually only occur if a thread takes a noticeable turn and doesn't return to the original topic. Usually, topic-drifting threads will be locked as the split function is somewhat limited in its ability.

Also rarely, two threads may be merged into one if they become redundant. Usually, redundant threads will be locked as the merge function is somewhat limited in its ability.

The "Free Speech" clause simply says that the US Constitution does not prevent SFO from creating and enforcing rules. Some crafty trolls try to use that excuse, so this nips it in the bud.

[DZComposer]

Just a reminder, these rules are not final. If you have any input, issues, changes you want made, let me know.

The main reason for rules is to maintain civility, and to keep people from posting things that could get SFO sued.

The illegal rule comes because there are some legal cases where forum owners are being held liable for what their members are posting.

Now, the song lyrics part is probably one of the things you will have issues with, so let me clarify something. Firstly, the reason that is on the list is that the Music Publishers have started a lawsuit campaign against sites hosting lyrics.

Posting a few lines is not a problem, as that can be considered fair use.

If SFO gets sued, it is likely that it all goes away. Mr. Krystal and I have worked too hard to rebuild this community after the sfo.com collapse to have it end that way.

I'm not trying to be draconian here. This isn't going to change the way I moderate things, nor will it really increase the number of threads I lock. Really, all of the new rules we already have, but are just unwritten.

Please, voice your opinion now. I don't want to implement these rules and all of the sudden get mobbed by people who don't like them. NOW is the time to mob me if you don't like them.

[DZComposer]

Last week for questions.comments/recommendations/concerns before these go into effect.

[DoctorAllosaurus]

Everything looks fine to me.

[ARWINGCOMMANDER 3987]

I don't have a problem.

[Mr. Krystal]

largely the same as before. Could you highlight the differences?

[Zwolf]

Guys, check the dates... This was last year. 11-7 (in the title) is November 7th...

[DZComposer]

These rules have been in effect for months. Please check thread dates.