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Written by Administrator
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The following Terms of Service (TOS) apply to all forums at AAQ. Any additional forum-specific guidelines will be posted in a sticky thread at the top of that forum.
Breach of Guidelines
In most cases, a violation of these rules will result in a warning. A repeat violation may result in you being banned temporarily (for a day or two), or permanent ban in the case of serious repeated incidents.
While this may sound harsh, our aim is to build a community that people feel comfortable participating in, an open forum where people can exchange ideas and have spirited discussions, while treating people with respect and being treated with respect.
Moderators and their Actions
The moderators are volunteers, and will do their best to enforce the guidelines as they see fit. That may include deleting posts that break the guidelines, locking, splitting or moving threads. They will also be expected to use their own judgement where something falls within a grey area, and the moderators are chosen for their common sense, patience and maturity. Also remember that they are also only human, and may make mistakes from time to time.
Publicly disrespecting a moderator, or failing to follow instructions given by a moderator, is a serious offence and can result in serious action as outlined above. If you disagree with the actions of a moderator, PM or send an email to discuss it.
1. Inappropriate Material - It can be expected that children as young as 15 may visit the forums. Please don't post material that would not be appropriate for a 15 year old.
- Please avoid profanity, we're trying to encourage a family atmosphere and sense of community. Please don't try to bypass the profanity filter by substituting a letter with a number, intentionally misspelling the word, etc.
2. Respect - Please show respect for others in the community, as you would expect to have respect shown to you.
- Please avoid posting something that is intended to cause a reaction. Don't call people names or attack them or their character.
- No racial slurs will be tolerated.
- Think before you post. Think before you press submit. Re-Read the original post and read your reply before posting.
3. Posting Topics - Avoid topics about race, politics or religion. These can be very sensitive topics and it can be very easy to take things the wrong way, creating arguments.
- Please keep threads on-topic and avoid spam or "chit-chat" within the specialised forums. The "General Chat" forum should be used for all off-topic posts that don't belong in the specialised forums. Off-topic means posts about stuff that isn't related to astronomy.
- "Spam" is a post with no useful content, no purpose except to get other people to reply with spam, and to increase your post count. Spam is not welcome anywhere on the forum.
- When creating a new thread, please ensure the thread title is descriptive of the content of the post.
4. Vendors and Advertising - Vendors are not permitted to post advertising on the forums.
- Advertising on or behalf of a vendor is not permitted either directly or indirectly by displaying links to a vendor in a member's signature.
- Vendors are permitted to participate in discussions but not promote or sell their products. That is, they are free and welcome to post in their capacity as an amateur astronomer or stargazer but in their capacity as a vendor, they should only state information in a thread that discusses one of their products. Their signature may include a link to their company website, providing they seek permission from IceInSpace.
- Vendors are to refrain from commenting on their competitors equipment/products (directly or indirectly). Please restrain your comments to products you manufacture or sell.
- When discussing a vendor, be careful about what you post as it can be easy for comments to be taken the wrong way and a vendor may take offence. In general, remember to be specific about your experience or opinion, don't generalise and don't play judge and jury. Think and re-read before pressing submit.
5. Copyright and Privacy - Do not post copyrighted material. If you are posting something that includes material or images from another source or website, credit the original source and include only an excerpt with a link to the original article.
- Please respect others privacy and do not post E-mails or PM's without the express permission of the other person(s) involved.
- Do not post personal information (real name, e-mail, etc.) concerning another user without that person's express written permission
6. Images and Attachments - When attaching images or displaying images in your posts, please keep the size to 150kb. The dimensions aren't restricted as a thumbnail will be shown. If you want to show an image larger than this, upload it to some web space and provide a link, warning how large the image is.
- Do not hot link to images stored on other websites. That is, do not use the [ IMG] tag to display in-line images in your post. It adds to their bandwidth, and it gives users no choice in loading the image, which can slow down page loads.
7. Avatars and Signatures - Avatars must be no bigger than 80x80 and 25k in size.
- Please keep signatures to a minimum, and don't have large blocks of text or images in your signature. Please try to keep them smaller than 3-5 lines in size. Remember that there could be 20 signatures on a single loaded page, and sometimes it's hard to find the post amongst the signatures. Please be considerate and keep them as small as possible. HTML is not allowed in signatures. Use vbCode instead.
8. Disruptive Behaviour - The moderators and administrators reserve the right to take action against a poster who is disrupting the normal flow of the forum. This includes violations listed in the other rules, but may also include inciting trouble, provoking reactions, generally attempting to disrupt the spirit of the forum and other behaviour not yet foreseen. Since this rule is general, we will attempt to correct the problem by warning the violator (via PM, email, or posting in the thread) and giving him/her a chance to explain his/her behaviour, and we will take further action only if proven necessary.
9. Liability - The thoughts posted by any AAQ member are their own, and do not necessarily reflect the thoughts of the site Administrators or Moderators.
- You agree, by participating in this forum and enjoying the benefits of same, that any exchanges between members in any thread and any Private Messages are matters between such individual members for the purposes of any legal obligations that might arise, such as allegations of defamation or statements and representations (such as in the Buy, Sell and Trade section) which may constitute misleading and deceptive conduct under the Trade Practices Act or similar legislation. The administrators and moderators of this forum cannot be held liable for the free actions and posts of members. For abundant causation, it should be noted that by taking on a moderating role, the administrators and moderators expressly do not take on any responsibility for the content of any contribution or post that any forum member may make.
- Please note, that because of the threaded conversation-like nature of discussion boards, we reserve the right to refuse a users request for a mass delete of their own posts or a deletion of their account. This includes images and attachments. That is to say, at the time that a member posts any contribution on the forum, they immediately waive all claims of copyright over that work for all time in relation to such contributions appearing on the AAQ forum, but not otherwise.
- By registering to the AAQ Forums, or by being registered and participating in the AAQ Forums, you agree to the guidelines posted above.
Reporting Bad Posts
If you see a post that is offensive or you believe is in breach of the guidelines, please help the moderators by using the "report bad post" button - it's the "red button with white text" icon at the top right hand corner of every post. Your actions will be most welcome, and treated with confidentiality.
Rule Additions and Revisions
The administrators reserve the right to modify existing rules and/or add additional rules as they see fit. In many ways, this forum is like a living thing, subject to change. Situations sometimes arise which cannot be anticipated, and thus, rules must be added to accommodate them.
Thanks for your assistance in adhering to these guidelines, and together we'll continue to foster the great sense of community we have here at AAQ.
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