Code of Conduct

Code of Conduct

Treat others with courtesy and respect

Treat other members as you would want to be treated. Express your opinions about another persons ideas, not about them personally. Keep threads started by others on topic if requested to do so. Respect the privacy of others by not posting personal information or images of another person that are outside the public domain without their consent

Do not post threats of violence or hate speech

Racist, sexist, homophobic, transphobic, and otherwise discriminatory, defamatory or offensive language will not be tolerated. Comments that gratuitously attack or demean individuals or organizations are not acceptable. Inciting anyone to commit a crime may itself be a crime don’t do it. Any such posts may be deleted and the user banned from the site.

Do not harass other members

phillynewsnow Blog is a community that values the privacy and safety of our members. Stalking or harassment of other members either in the public forums or through private messaging will not be tolerated. This includes taking board disputes off-site. Such behavior will result in a ban and possible reporting to legal authorities.

Do not behave in a disruptive manner

You agree not to disrupt or interfere with discussions or other functions of the phillynewsnow Community. Disruptive behavior may include, but is not limited to: creating a disproportionate number of posts or discussions which disrupt conversation; cross-posting the same text in different threads; creating off-topic posts or intentionally posting them to irrelevant forum categories; making statements that are deliberately inflammatory (trolling; repeatedly misusing the Report function; or any other behavior that interferes with conversation or inhibits the ability of members to use and enjoy this website for its intended purposes.

Watch your language

Name-calling and otherwise abusive, vulgar or obscene language is not acceptable. There is zero tolerance for pornography, sexually explicit content, and depictions of graphic or gratuitous violence this includes language, images and URL links. We will report child abuse/exploitation to the police.

User Identity

Members are allowed to participate anonymously on phillynewsnow Community. User names, profiles, and avatar pictures must not be offensive in nature. Do not impersonate others, create false profiles (sock puppets), or use names representative of divine figures of any religion. Once registered, user identity can only be changed through contact with moderators, and only for validly presented reasons.

Respect others’ intellectual property

Members are responsible for ensuring that they have the rights to all material they post. Text or images posted should have permission or a creative commons (or similar) license. Use links rather than posting if in doubt. If quoting from other sources, be sure to include the source and link to the original work. It is helpful to identify the copied material using quote tags, quotation marks or in italic font.

Selling and solicitation are not permitted

The sale of goods and/or services and the solicitation of funds is prohibited on the forums save for those engaged in raising funds for the maintenance of phillynewsnow Community or in sub-forums or threads that may be designated for this purpose.

Provide valid contact information

Members must provide a valid e-mail address when registering for phillynewsnow Community. Our moderators must be able to contact you by e-mail if necessary to discuss your account. If the address you provide is not valid, your privileges may be suspended; should this occur you can contact the admins at phillyfinestserverstat@gmail.com.

Report violations to Council

If you feel that a post in a forum or personal conversation violates this Community Code of Conduct:

  1. Click on Report at the bottom of the post that concerns you.
  2. In the Report Reason box, explain why you are reporting the post, referencing if possible the specific rule in the code that you feel was violated.
  3. Click Report Post.

The report goes into a queue and will be dealt with by a moderator (for forum reports) or administrator (for Personal Conversation reports). Administrators deal with personal conversation issues in order to preserve the security and privacy of these more private communications as much as possible.