Forum Guidelines V.1

These forums are a place for the following:

1. APC student organizations to transact with the SAO offices
2. APC student assistants to coordinate duty hours with other offices
3. APC offices and student organizations to secure requests for the APC Performing Arts Group (PAG)

The Student Activities Office works hard to keep these boards helpful and on-topic.

Failure to follow these guidelines can result in your posts being moved, locked or deleted, and may result in your posting rights being removed.


No Swearing
Posts containing profanity, obscenity, insults, personal attacks, accusations or abusive language will be deleted and can result in a warning or suspension.

Using asterisks (*) or other characters to get around the swear filter is still considered profanity, as is using as abbreviations that stand for profanity. Post titles are subject to the same restrictions as post content. Even if the post content is not objectionable, posts can be deleted if the title violates those guidelines. If others have posted in reply, and all the replies feature the same offending title, then the entire thread may be removed.

Racial, religious or sexual slurs may result in immediate banning.


No Flaming
This includes any kind of personal attack, flame, targeted harassment or intimidation either by board posts or private messages.

"But he flamed me first!" is NOT an acceptable reason to insult another poster. A flame war is a flame war, and it doesn’t matter who started it. If you have concerns about the treatment you are receiving at the hands of another poster, don’t respond in kind; notify SAO immediately.

Argue someone’s ideas, not their intelligence; feel free to debate, but don’t take it to a personal level.


Stay On-Topic
If you’re posting in a PAG-related forum, don’t start talking about the evaluation of your organizations last activity -- we’ve set up different forums so that all the posts in one area are relevant to specific aspects of SAO. If you want to talk about the weather or such, use the Off Topic forum.


No Spamming
Spamming includes creating the same post multiple times in a forum, repeatedly posting on the same topic in different threads, or posting the same post in multiple areas.

Multiple posts, whether on the same boards or different boards, will be locked or deleted.


No Thread Bumping
Posting messages with irrelevant content for the sole purpose of keeping certain posts near the top is called "bumping". This causes other posts to scroll off the page faster than they should, and raises forum traffic unnecessarily.

If you think of something you’d like to add to a post after making it is recommend to use the Edit Post button instead of making an additional post. Bumping threads can cause threads to be locked, and can result in a warning.


Respect Others’ Opinions
Many arguments cannot be won, and simply end up scrolling all the other posts off the boards. When disagreements resort to "Since you seem to be slow, let me repeat my points for the tenth time..." then it's a sign that the argument is going nowhere, and the thread will be locked. Agree to disagree.


Reporting Posts
Should you spot a post you feel requires the attention of a moderator or administrator you can report it using the button in the top right-hand corner of the post. Please be aware that while this forum is moderated regularly it may not always be possible to address posts that require moderation immediately, however all “problem” posts will be dealt with.

Abuse of the Report Post system will be subject to the same discipline as abuse of any other system in place on this site.


Personal Messages
This message board allows users to send personal messages to one another through an enclosed system. While this means that while no other public user will be able to read the contents of your message all PMs are subject to the same moderation as the rest of the forum.

Sending offensive personal messages to someone through our boards system can be considered harassment or a personal attack, and will be subject to the same discipline as posts made on the regular forums. If you receive a Personal Message and it makes you feel in any way uncomfortable, report to SAO immediately.


Signature Graphics, Avatars, Links, and Screenshots
Signature pictures must be kept under 20K in file size, and be no larger than 450 x 120 pixels (similar to a banner ad). Avatars must also be kept under 50K in file size and 80x80 pixels.

Using the .jpg or .gif format for screenshots, rather than the .bmp format, helps reduce the file size, as does limiting animation.

All files and content linked to and from the boards are subject to the same content guidelines as those posted directly on the boards.

You are welcome to post screenshots or other pictures within posts, however these should be posted as links rather than full size images which stretch the forum and slow page loading.


Hotlinking Graphics
If you use an avatar, signature or graphic that is stored on an external site, please make sure you have the site owners' permission to use it here before doing so.


Multiple Accounts
Each user of these forums is permitted one account only. Multiple accounts belonging to a single user will be removed. Users who create secondary accounts to get around a temporary ban will be banned permanently.


Languages
We require recommend that all posts made to these boards be in English.