Forum rules

[kaputtnik]

Because of some incidents in the forum we should discuss to implement forum rules.

GunChleoc proposed:

1. Please be friendly to everybody
2. Take into account that not everybody speaks English well, and that we
have cultural diversity
3. If you are having an issue with another forum member, please contact
the admins via PM so that we can help to resolve the issue. Do not take
any action yourself.
4. Any posts containing insults or ad hominem attacks will be removed at
our discretion
5. The admins reserve the right to issue warnings or bans as we see fit.

I would also add a sentence regarding spam.

If we implement forum rules, i would advise to add a checkbox "I do agree on the forum rules". We can implement this per user before a forum post will be submitted the first time:

1. The first time a user submits a forum post the checkbox is unchecked. The user has to check it before the post get submitted.
2. Once checked, so one post has been submitted, the checkbox is marked ever checked for this user.

Doing it this way, we can be sure every user had the possibility to read the forum rules.

[GunChleoc (gunchleoc)]

Some more rule examples:

Politeness

1. Read before you post. If you are new in the community, please keep reading the forums for a while to get a feel for the place.

2. Misunderstandings. Please compose your posts carefully. If you want to use irony, make sure people will understand what you mean. Irony is a two-edged sword. Use the preview function to check the results before submitting.

3. Be nice. We welcome all kinds of opinions as long as they are stated in a polite fashion. Posts that belittle or condemn other opinions or otherwise offer disrespect to the members and moderators of widelands.org or persons or organisations outside widelands.org will be deleted. Visitors who are repeatedly offensive will be asked to leave.

4. Watch your language. Please keep in mind that anyone may visit these pages regardless of age and as such we ask that you word your comments appropriately. Please also keep in mind that visitors to the site come from around the globe and misunderstandings can easily occur. Though this might seem obvious, please don't forget that we are posting to the www here - that's the World Wide Web.

5. Reacting to offensive posts. If any post at the forum should offend you, keep calm and think before you react. Notifying the moderators is a good strategy, retaliating with an angry post is not.

Netiquette

1. Privacy. Please be careful about disclosing personal information. Do not post your email-address or phone number etc. by any means! If you know other members' real names or other personal details, don't disclose them without permission. Again, this is the World Wide Web.

2. Spam. We have a no quarter given policy towards spammers. If the moderators or administrators happen upon anything they might consider spam, it will be deleted without comment. This includes signatures and user accounts as well as messages. If you feel you have been deleted in error, please feel free to contact the admins.

[GunChleoc (gunchleoc)]

We do not tolerate any slandering or disrespect of ANY kind, in ANY context, towards ANYONE.

It is easy for our multi-national and multi-cultural membership to misinterpret some meanings. Please contact an Admin or Mod if you have concerns. All openly disrespectful posts will be deleted immediately with no questions asked. Continued posting of inflammatory and disrespectful posts will result in banning of the Username and IP address.

[kaputtnik (franku)]

The rules should be as short as possible, otherwise they won't be read at all. They should also be understandable to non native english speakers, so simple english is wanted, at least by me :-D

Most of the problems are caused by personal feelings, and not about the game. I think this is the main problem and should be one of the first rules:

1. If you feel personally attacked, please do not answer directly! Take some time and let the bad feelings go away before you answer a post. The reasons why you feel bad can be a result of:

2. Cultural differences...

3. Non native english speaker...

4. ...

[SirVer (sirver)]

My 2 cents on this: I am a fan of a code of conduct and if we establish something, we should not limit it to the forum, but to all interactions related to Widelands. I personally think a CoC must contain both the rules and values, but also the action taken when it is violated. One of my favorite ones is the one from the Rust community, which I think we can in large parts just steal:

https://www.rust-lang.org/en-US/conduct.html

[GunChleoc (gunchleoc)]

Issue moved to https://github.com/widelands/widelands-website/issues/290