Forum Rules

More specific rules governing the use of this forum are described below.

Who Can Do What

Guests

All who visit this forum can view messages the public boards and topics on the South Shenandoah Forum. Visitors cannot create messages.

Members

All who register a member account with SouthShenandoah.Net are members of the South Shenandoah Forum. Members can post items in the all forum boards.

All who participate in this forum are expected to be adults and act accordingly. Specifically:

• Post in a relevant forum area. Read the forum descriptions before posting.
• Be respectful of others. Flaming or abusing users in any way will not be tolerated.
• Don’t act as a “back seat moderator.” If you note an issue that contravenes a rule, bring it to the attention of the moderator. Do not respond to such topics yourself. Members who consistently act as moderators will be warned.
• This Forum may be viewed by anyone. Write as if you’re writing to a friend or a member of your family. We don’t tolerate posting pornographic or generally offensive text, images, links, etc..
• Respect the copyright of other visitors, sites, media, etc.
• Respect the bandwidth of other users and sites. The use of in-line image tags that point to data stored on third party systems for which the member has not received permission to use will be removed.
• Post in a way consistent with normal writing.
  • Don’t use an excessive number of emoticons, large, small or colored text, and so forth.
  • Don’t SHOUT or use excessive punctuation (multiple exclamation and question marks) in titles or posts.
  • Use an appropriate, descriptive title when posting a new topic. Examples of bad titles include: “Help me!,” “I’m stuck!,” “I’ve got an error!” etc.

Spam

This includes:

• Advertising services of any sort for any or no cost
• Commercial, religious, or political solicitations
• Recruiting of any sort

The administrator may edit or remove any post at any time. The determination of what is construed as indecent, vulgar, spam, etc. as noted in these points is up to the administrator who, unlike spammers, is responsible for his own decisions and acts.

These policies apply to private messaging. Abuse of the private messaging system may lead to warnings and/or the revocation of private messaging.

Signatures

Members may create signatures that contain up to five lines (one line being that displayed on a browser opened to 800px width) of text and/or one image. Valid combinations include:

• A single image no more than 60px high, 468px wide, and 6kB (6000 Bytes) in size
• Signatures containing an image this large may also include one line of text
• Signatures containing an image of 30px high may include up to two lines of normal size text
• Images of 15px height or less may allow up to three lines of text
• Animated images are not allowed
• Signatures are subject to the same conditions as posts regarding 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 include links in a way that suggests you offer official support, software, etc.
• You may not link to sites that contain or promote Warez , pornography, politics, or racism
• Links are included in signature size limits

Avatars

Your avatar is that which you select when you register a member account with SouthShenandoah.Net. If you haven’t chosen an avatar or uploaded an image to use, no avatar will be shown for you.

Off–Site Links

• General linking (within posts) to other sites is permitted where links are in a “support context.”
• Acceptable support contexts include (but aren’t limited to) problems with software, hardware, and so forth.
• Unacceptable support contexts include requests for hosting providers, questions and discussion of personal, social, religious, or political matters.

Self–Promotion

Policing

We have a “three–strike” policy. Members who receive three warnings in a three-month period for rules violations identified above will be notified that they are temporary banned from Forum participation for up to seven days. A member will be banned permanently from ths forum for:

• Re–registering under a different username
• Changing IP addresses to evade an IP ban
• Registering a new e–mail account to evade an e-mail ban
• Using insulting, indecent, or vulgar language when contacting the moderator