Forum Rules

Subject: Forum Rules Mon Jan 04, 2010 8:24 am

Forum rules

Posts are to be made in the relevant forum. Users are asked to read the forum descriptions before posting. Users consistently posting to the wrong forum may be given a warning (see policing below).

Members should post in a way that is respectful of other users. Flaming or abusing users in any way will not be tolerated and will lead to a warning.

Members are asked to not act as “back seat moderators”. If members note an issue which contravenes something in this policy document they are welcome to bring it to the attention of a member of the Moderator Team. Please use the “post report” feature to report posts. Do not respond to such topics yourself. Members who constantly “act” as moderators may be warned.

Members should remember this board is aimed at a general audience. Posting pornographic or generally offensive text, images, links, etc. will not be tolerated and will lead to a warning.

Members are asked to respect the copyright of other users, sites, media, etc. Users linking to or asking for information on warez, crackz, etc. or re-printing material without permission will receive a warning and their post will be removed.

Members are asked only to post in English, as this is an English speaking community. Localised support is available at the international support sites.

Members should respect the bandwidth of other users and sites. The use of inline ([IMG][/IMG]) image tags pointing to data stored on third party systems for which the user has not received permission to link to may be removed.

Members should post in a way which is consistent with "normal writing". That is users should not post excessive numbers of emoticons, large, small or coloured text, etc. Similarly users should not SHOUT or use excessive punctuation (e.g. ! and ?) in topic titles or posts. Users consistently abusing this will be warned.

Members should use an appropriate, descriptive subject when posting a new topic. Examples of bad subjects include; "Help me!", "I'm stuck!", "I've got an error!", etc. Examples of good subjects include; "Getting an TABLE FULL error upon login", "Cannot restore a backup", etc.

Members are welcome to use the test forum for general "test purposes". These may include checking signatures, testing a link or image, etc. (subject to previous points on decency, warez, etc.).

Spam is not tolerated here under any circumstance. This includes offering hosting services (charged and free), installation services, solicitation etc. Recruiting members for your own projects (moderators, designers, professional MOD work, etc.) is not permitted and is also considered spam. Users posting spam will be warned and their post removed. See specific item on spam and 3rd party linking for more information.

The moderating, support and other teams reserve the right to edit, remove or put on moderation queue any post at any time. Please note that currently any very first post is automatically placed in the moderation queue and will be approved/disapproved according to the present Rules. The determination of what is construed as indecent, vulgar, spam, etc. as noted in these points is up to Team Members and not users.

The above forum rules where applicable also apply to private messaging. Abuse of the private messaging system may lead to warnings (as above) and/or the revocation of private messaging.

Signatures

Signatures may contain up to five lines of text (of small or normal size) and/or one image, valid combinations include; a single image of no more than 60px high, 468px wide and 6KiB (6144 Bytes) in size. Signatures containing an image this large may also include one line of small size text. Signatures containing an image of 30px high may include up to three lines of small size text or two lines of normal size text. Images of 15px height or less may allow up to three lines of normal size text or four lines of small size text.

Text sizes should be between 75% and 100% (small and normal). Text in signatures is subject to the same conditions as posts with respect decency, warez, emoticons, and so forth.

Links in signatures are permitted to a maximum of four unique pages or sites. Linked sites may be commercial in nature. You may not link to warez, porn, racist or other similar hate sites. Links are included in signature size limits.

Avatars

Users are permitted to utilise a gallery avatar or to link to one of their own (subject to previous points on misuse of bandwidth). User defined avatars are to be no larger than 120 pixels square, contain no animation, contain no image which attempts to portray the user as having an official status here (e.g. mimicking ranks or copying avatars of team members), may not exceed 12KiB (12288 Bytes) in filesize and have a consistently high availability (i.e. links to images on slow servers or those prone to failure may be removed).

Avatars are subject to the same conditions as posts with respect decency, and so forth.

Users abusing these rules will be warned and/or may lose their avatar privileges.

Policing

PoAW operates a three strike policy. Users will be warned a maximum of three times for any and all offences in a three month period. If the need arises for a fourth warning a temporary ban will be put in place of between 1 to 7 days.

Arguing with team members after having received a warning will lead to an immediate additional warning. Should this exceed three strikes a temporary ban will be put in place as above.

Users who feel they have been unfairly warned are welcome to contact the relevant team leader, e.g. if warned by a moderator you should contact the Moderator team leader. If they feel you were treated badly they remove a warning.

Any attempt to circumvent a temporary ban or other moderator action will lead to a permanent ban of your account(s). Circumvention includes re-registering or using an already registered account under a non-banned username. Other examples include changing IP addresses, using a new email account or other action that can be taken to evade moderator action to hide your identity as the owner of the sanctioned account.

An exception to the three strike rule applies when users contact team members personally (via any method) and post insulting, indecent or vulgar material. Such users may be subject to an immediate permanent ban.

Permanent bans are a last resort and thought is given before implementing them. While Poaw may consider lifting permanent bans from time to time this is a rare occurrence.