Forum Rules - Please Read!

[BobCat]

We want to make sure that our boards stay safe and friendly for all who use them, so I've come up with the guidelines that follow for all to read and keep in mind when using our site. Also, I would prefer that we not solicit here for any reason, even if the charity or person is deserving. There's nothing wrong with talking about favorite shelters or charities; I just don't want to feel responsible for researching and determining what organizations are and are not legitimate should someone begin asking for donations.

Thanks,
BC


Be Courteous! We aim to ensure that the forum is an enjoyable place that you want to visit time and time again. Treating each other with respect and kindness, and thinking before you speak will go a long way towards making this an enjoyable place. We take the "be nice" rule very seriously.

• Do not engage in personal attacks on public or private individuals or entities in posts or via the PM system.
• Do not post libelous remarks or directly misleading information.
• Do not post the same discussion more than once or in many forums.
• The language of this forum is English. If you are not a native English speaker, do your best. We are glad to have you as a member and will be supportive and polite.

Be Appropriate! Posts containing explicit, obscene or vulgar language, images or links to websites with adult content/images or punctuation marks designed to "trick" our obscenity filter may be removed. Discussion of politics and religion is strongly discouraged as we are an international and diverse group with many opinions.

Be Ethical and Don't SPAM! Some participants may have commercial interests associated with the forum topic and bring valuable information and expertise to share but participants may not use the Forum for commercial gain.

• No SPAM! Participants may not post to direct others to any pages at their own commercial website or website in which they have a commercial interest, including informational pages.
• Participants may not send out SPAM via our Private Message system.
• Our user base is not an unlimited resource to be "mined" by individuals, groups, or businesses, for profit or not for profit. If you want to solicit the board for information when writing a book or article, please ask a moderator first.
• Trolling, cyber-bullying, harassment, stalking or predatory behavior is NOT allowed in posts, PM's or any other section of our forum and is grounds for account restriction or banishment.

Do Not Post Protected / Copyrighted Content: Information copyrighted or owned by any individual or entity other than the member should not be posted without the consent of the owner. Copyrighted material includes images and text produced and owned by others. If such an event occurs, the individual posting the information shall be held solely responsible. You cannot legally post entire articles, images or news without permission from the copyright holder. Even if you attribute the content correctly it’s still copyright infringement. Under Fair Use provisions you can legally post a small abstract of an article - or perhaps the opening paragraph. The exception to this rule is press releases; they are meant for distribution and can be copied and distributed. If you are not sure if you can copy something then always err on the side of caution and simply post a link to the material.

Signature Standards: Signatures are set up in your profile. They will appear at the bottom of every post you make.

• Signatures must contain no commercial content.
• Signatures may not include email addresses or prompts to contact or a sales pitch.
• Members may include a non-commercial link in their signature but no links to files or downloads.