APTS FORUMS

Welcome to the GC Forum! These forums are here to provide you with a friendly environment where you can discuss ideas, give advice, and converse about any other aspects of public broadcasting with your fellow stations. Community forums are at their best when participants treat their fellow posters with respect and courtesy. Therefore, we ask that you conduct yourself in a civilized manner when participating in these forums.

Posting Guidelines
We have provided you will a few guidelines to follow below. While these do technically fall within the bounds of the Code of Conduct, they cover more specific examples of common errors that will lead to thread deletions or posting privileges being revoked.

The GC forum is provided specifically to discuss funding for public broadcasting and related topics. Any topics not related to public broadcasting are subject to deletion.

• Don't post in all capital letters, use a misleading title, excessive punctuation and/or non-standard symbols, etc.
  While everyone wants their posts read, we ask you to refrain from using these types of tactics in order to bring more people to your thread. Let your post stand on its own merit. Threads violating this guideline are subject to deletion.
• Do not "bump" posts.
  The act of posting simply to bump a thread is considered spamming. This also includes bumping very old threads for no reason (called "necro bumping" or "necroing").
• Petition posts are frowned upon.
  These are discussion forums and, as such, we ask that you hold discussions. Creating a thread to ask for replies as votes is not a discussion. Threads violating this guideline are subject to deletion.
• Do not post about locked or deleted threads.
  Posts that are moderated have a reason behind the moderation. It's up to you to read the forum Code of Conduct and these guidelines to determine what you did wrong, learn from your mistake, and attempt to post again without breaking any rules.

There is also a cool down period we institute during times of high forum traffic. If you are violating policy during one of these times due to frustration, you will be given a three-hour cool down suspension. This does not get logged on your record and is simply in place to keep the forums readable and civil. Serious violations will still have the appropriate action taken against them as documented in the Code of Conduct, and we do keep track of these cool down periods separately—if one is found to be repeatedly violating policy, appropriate action will be taken.

Code of Conduct:
The guidelines and rules listed below explain what behavior is expected of you and what behavior you can expect from other community members. Note that the following guidelines are not exhaustive, and may not address all manner of offensive behavior. As such, the forum moderators shall have full discretion to address any behavior that they feel is inappropriate. Your access to these forums is a “privilege,” and not a “right.” The Association of Public Television Stations reserves the right to suspend your access to these forums at any time for reasons that include, but are not necessarily limited to, your failure to abide by these guidelines.

We reserve the right to evaluate each incident on a case by case basis. The action we take may be more lenient or more severe than those listed under each category:

Racial / Ethnic
This category includes both clear and masked language and/or links to websites containing such language or images which:

• Promote racial/ethnic hatred.
• Are recognized as a racial/ethnic slur.
• Allude to a symbol of racial/ethnic hatred.

Extreme Sexuality / Violence
This category includes both clear and masked language and/or links to websites containing such language or images which:

• Refer to extreme and/or violent sexual acts.
• Refer to extremely violent real life actions.
• Pornography.

Sexual Preference
This category includes both clear and masked language and/or links to websites containing such language or images which:

• Insultingly refer to any aspect of sexual preference pertaining to themselves or other members.

Obscene / Vulgar
This category includes both clear and masked language in posts, signatures, and/or links to websites containing such language or images which:

• Are an inappropriate reference to human anatomy or bodily functions.
• Are pornographic in nature.

Inappropriate Language
This category includes language and/or links to websites containing such language or images which:

• Are a mildly inappropriate reference to human anatomy or bodily functions.
• Are otherwise considered objectionable.
• Bypass the Mature Language filter.

Major Religions or Religious Figures
This category includes both clear and masked language and/or links to websites containing such language or images which:

• Negatively portray major religions or religious figures.

National
This category includes language and/or links to websites containing such language or images which:

• Promote national hatred.
• Are recognized as national slurs.
• Allude to symbols of national hatred.

Illegal Drugs or Activities
This category includes both clear and masked language and/or links to websites containing such language or images which:

• Reference to abusing illegal drugs.
• Reference to performing illegal activities.

Spamming or Trolling
This category includes:

• Excessively communicating the same phrase, similar phrases, or pure gibberish.
• Creating threads for the sole purpose of causing unrest on the forums.
• Causing disturbances in forum threads, such as picking fights, making off topic posts that ruin the thread, insulting other posters.
• Making non-constructive posts.
• Abusing the Reported Post feature by sending false alarms or nonsensical messages.

Advertising
This category includes advertisement of:

• Any non-beneficial, related businesses, organizations, or websites.