Forum Rules V2.(>0)

Hi all, the latest revision of what'll hopefully be our working List of Laws once we finish "beta testing" is up here.

Thoughts and input are welcome; hell, I'll even accept if I've phrased something badly and it needs tweaking. If you guys don't like a rule or how we've decided to deal with a rule, speak up! It's meant to be open to input, else I would've slapped 'em up with the subtitle "WORSHIP OR BURN, BITCHES."

As global guidelines, these don't have to be spelt out as necessarily hard and fast; it's definitely more the spirit of the thing.

In addition to this, I'm considering a list of links in a second post to help a newcomer find their way around - but maybe that can come later.

Apparently I'm not authorised to gaze upon the glory of the contents of that link.

Oooooops

That should've fixed it. Thanks, whoosh!

I gazed upon it and it was indeed glorious. These rules seem to be the height of good sense and as such I can only agree with them. :>

Well, I do have a few thoughts.

-Mention "No quote pyramids" in the "keep it tidy" part, unless we're hard-coding that.
-Related to the above, "spoiler irrelevant quotes and discussion".
-Point for discussion: Height limits on signatures. I don't have strong feelings on this, but it strikes me as something that would be good to talk about before officially settling on a specific number. Personally, I'm fine with the 80 pixel limit, but I wouldn't mind seeing it raised to 100.

The 80 pixel hard limit at mspa angers me. I say we go with how it used to be there. 80 pixels with leeway as long as you don't go ludicrous.

As far as sig limits go, we're not going to be taking out a ruler and checking every time we see a sig. As long as it's not blatantly over it, I doubt we'll do anything.

It's like the rest of the rules- the spirit is more important than the letter by a long shot. An 85px sig isn't about to break anything or ruin anyone's day, but the number needs to go somewhere and that's as good a place as any.

Probably it won't be important for a long time yet, but redirecting new users to the Rules Page upon first login would be nice. Would work well in conjunction with the proposed list of helpful links. Although if this is instituted, there may need to be a few changes in the Rules Page structure to make people, Iunno, want to read it, I guess?

On that note (while not really a suggestion for the rules themselves), once we get closer to finalizing the rules some colorful banners might be nice to have.

Also that first bit with the "Welcome to Eagle Time" is kinda easy to miss.

Contact me if you need any help with those colorful banners!

"an account on these find forums"

Should that be fine forums?

Well, I do have a few thoughts.

-Mention "No quote pyramids" in the "keep it tidy" part, unless we're hard-coding that.
-Related to the above, "spoiler irrelevant quotes and discussion".
-Point for discussion: Height limits on signatures. I don't have strong feelings on this, but it strikes me as something that would be good to talk about before officially settling on a specific number. Personally, I'm fine with the 80 pixel limit, but I wouldn't mind seeing it raised to 100.

Quote pyramids are hard-coded in.
Spoiler etiquette is something we'll figure out - but there'd definitely be an especial notification in the Forum Adventures rules. Cool Shit You Can Do is basically the subforum for "things that aren't free chat and thus should have spoilered tangents".
80px honestly would allow you an easy 90px, but if we raised the limit to 100 then that makes 120px "acceptable". So we'll keep it small.

Contact me if you need any help with those colorful banners!

I'm quoting you on this. I was definitely envisioning an eagle with a big muscly arm and a constable hat for "The Long Arm", but your interpretation is welcome. Banners with "Welcome to Eagle Time", "The Golden Rule" and maybe one for the second post - something along the lines of "Navigation" or "Forum Map" or "Beginner's Guide to the Bends of the Forumpath". Or something. Those'd be the minimum, anyway - if you want to illustrate the subheadings with other pieces, they'd be most welcome!

The rules look good to me. I agree that signatures should be loosely enforced - the height limit is common sense, and the admins reserve the right to let you know if you pass that limit.

Okay i made two banners for the long arm featuring a big muscular eagle whom i have decided to call Officer Big Pecks.



But it was a bit too large, so i made another one.



Also this one



i'll make some more later

Couple of last fixes, leaving judgement calls to admins as to what qualifies as a-ok/anok behaviour. Also a caveat that just because we let you use NSFW tags to spare the gainfully employed an accidental disciplinary hearing over internet usage, doesn't mean we're condoning a "Post the grossest furry porn you've found on the internet" thread, either.

Again all rules are pretty much going with an unwritten "but you'll probably get away with it if nobody's offended and it's pretty funny" amendment, anyhow. Not that we're going to trumpet that to all and sundry, but it means moderation stays light provided nobody gets ticked off with each other. Cool?

Spooky ass necrobumpin' time

So.

We have a rules thread. Literally nobody gives a rat's ass about it probably because when we wrote it it was all common-sense stuff and over time Pines and I have given even less of a shit from an administrative perspective what people do or say.

In light of new folks joining the forum, I thought I might dust the Rules Thread off and let the community take a look at them and decide if anything needs amended, added, or excised (also because it feels tonally condescending four years down the line but idk). I'd especially really appreciate a discussion about how we can collectively moderate, even if it's just agreeing on super-basic ground rules about how to call each other out on our (hypothetical) shit so I can better-phrase that in a thread which tops literally every subforum.

Even posting "the current rules/system look fine idc" is a valuable contribution; I may be imagining up a problem where none exist and some assurance on that front would be super-useful! Chur.

You must be registered to view this content.

honestly has anyone on this forum besides spambots literally ever done something to get banned/suspended/otherwise punished for rules infractions

add a new rule saying we can peddle nuclear weaponry under the guise of "viagra"

"it will blow you up"

but yes everything looks in tip-top shape

To make a constructive post in response to Schaz's pretty darn reasonable request:

I can see what you mean with regards to the rule thread's tone if you look at it a certain way? That being said I think they're fine as is as they're mostly being a bit snarky at the concept of rulebreakers/lawyers n' it doesn't come off as mean-spirited or anything - more ET's loveable brand of sass (I might just be indoctrinated though).

As for what to do in the future of modmindom (just because we haven't had anything mod-attention-worthy happen doesn't mean it'll never happen), it's kinda tricky yeah.

I'd like to think if we just call each other out in threads when things are going south everyone here's reasonable enough to apologize and stop? Worst case people can talk it out in irc and call in a third party to adjudicate (knowing how the ET community sorta works probably an oldbie but I guess not necessarily) and if that still doesn't give us a satisfactory solution we invoke the last argument of wings and ask Pinary to step in.

(then again looking at it my post seems to be a wordier "the current rules/system look fine idc" so 'what said' I guess )

Some tempbannery type stuff happened in the forum's early days when people were still testing the waters and/or hollering memes that used slurs.

Other than that, most conflict resolution I've had a hand in was taking the time to talk shit out with the individuals in question, which is something I can do without some kind of implicit looming threat to tempban anyone who doesn't "fall in line".

Mostly the things I was wanting to change were the (outdated) references to mod response in the face of unseemly behaviour, taking out the stuff about trolling seeing as the entire concept feels hilariously antiquated? Also maybe some pointers about proactive pronoun usage idk

Mostly the things I was wanting to change were the (outdated) references to mod response in the face of unseemly behaviour, taking out the stuff about trolling seeing as the entire concept feels hilariously antiquated? Also maybe some pointers about proactive pronoun usage idk

Yeh these sound sensible.

Trolling's already covered in the be a teamfriend/don't be a dick rules anyhow.

You must be registered to view this content.

That's not trolling, it's an INSTITUTION