Along with the Terms of Use you agreed to follow when registering please note the following points with regards to use of the forums:

• Members should post in a way that is respectful and considerate of other users. Flaming or abusing users in any way will not be tolerated and will lead to a warning and possible editing and/or removal of the post. We appreciate that differences of opinion will occur on occasion, please state your ideas diplomatically and honestly and don’t take it personally if someone doesn’t share your opinions. The aim of the forums isn’t to ‘convert’ people it’s to exchange ideas.


• The moderators and admin staff reserve the right to edit or remove any post at any time if it is deemed to be rude, offensive or vulgar. The determination of what is construed as indecent, vulgar, spam, etc. as noted in these points is at the discretion of moderators and administrators. Should a post be removed from the forums the member concerned should be notified as to why it was necessary.


• Members who disagree about specific subjects are requested to discuss these via the private message system and not use the forums to conduct "I'm right, you're wrong" exchanges in the forums. None of us can expect everyone to agree with our point of view, simply state your case and move on otherwise the discussions become debates and thus counter productive. If you do feel that strongly and both parties are happy to debate, use a chat room if a spare one is available or the private message system to conduct your debate.


• In the unlikely event that there is a problem between specific individuals in the forums, members are asked to not act as "back seat moderators". If members note an issue that contravenes something in this policy document or something that they feel is not in the spirit of the community they are welcome to bring it to the attention of the administrators or moderators by sending a private message.


• If you have a complaint about another board user, one of our moderators, or anyone else please send a private message to an administrator with your complaint. Do not post accusations to the public boards; this is a private matter between you and the other party. We will investigate the situation promptly and hopefully find an amicable solution.


• Members should respect the bandwidth of other users and sites. The use of hotlinked ([IMG][/IMG]) image tags pointing to data stored on third party systems for which the user has not received permission to link should not be used. Please upload the image to the gallery or as an attachment to the post in question.


• Please avoid using your signature line to either promote other websites, websites may be added to your personal profile and our weblinks module instead.


• We do not allow the posting of banners in signature lines simply because they increase the page loading time - not everyone has broadband connections.


• Members should post in a way that is consistent with "normal writing". That is, users should not post excessive numbers of emoticons, large, small or coloured text, etc. Try and make it easy for others to read your posts. Similarly users should not SHOUT either in the post itself or in the title of the post.


• All posts should use punctuation and avoid ‘text message’ abbreviations.


• The dimensions of images that are posted in the forum should be no more than 450 pixels wide and 650 pixels high. If you have an image that’s larger than this you can still use it in the forums, but post it as an attachment rather than linking direct to it. By posting as an attachment it is automatically resized in the thread, but can still be viewed at full size if a member clicks on it.


• The purpose of the forums is to promote discussion. Please avoid posting excessive amounts of ‘cut and paste’ articles. If you do post information of this nature that you think others might be interested in, please add an explanation of your own stating YOUR thoughts on the information that has been posted. It is not acceptable to post chunks of text but not offer your own comment on them. If we see posts of this nature that do not offer comment, we reserve the right to delete, edit or move them.


• BE SPECIFIC in choosing a title for your post. It needs to be relative to the subject you are discussing and should give other members an idea of what the post is about. Try to make the title meaningful for example 'Who built the pyramids' rather then 'Question'.


• Feel free to start new topics as necessary, although if a similar topic exists, please post in it. It will move that topic to the top of the list and your post will be seen. It also is a good idea since there may be a few users subscribed to that posts notification.


• Try to take care to post your topic in the appropriate forum
  
  i.e. Introduction threads go in the Welcome forum; Humour goes in the fun stuff forum. but if in doubt just use your judgement.
  
  


• If posting a question where you need input from others, help us help you. When you post, post as much information as you can and tell us what you're looking for.


• Advertising or promotional Spam is not tolerated here under any circumstance. Users posting Spam will be warned and their post removed. ‘Spamming’ the forums by repeatedly posting one-line responses in threads or posting nonsensical responses to increase your post count will result in the offending posts being deleted. It doesn’t matter how many posts you have, its what you have to say that we’re interested in.


• This is a family based community. Please do not post URLs to inappropriate sites, such as pornography sites, warez sites, racist/hate sites, etc. Not only will your post be edited or outright removed from the forum, but also posting URLs to such sites may result in your posting privileges being revoked.


• Please refrain from the use of vulgar language, harassment of other users, racial or ethnic slurs, sexism, or slander.


• Images that are not appropriate for the workplace are not to be posted or used as avatars. Please do not use inappropriate images on our forums - ones endorsing pornography, software piracy; or those that "slam" any individual or company.


• Please do not publicly re-post private email without the express written permission of the e-mail's original sender (e-mail is protected by copyright).


• Do not publicly re-post private discussions with others that were held over messaging clients without permission from all the other owners (participants) of the messages.


• Out of courtesy and to avoid confusion to other forum users and moderators we expect you to use only one username on our forums. Please do not post email addresses, standard addresses, ICQ and other messaging client numbers, or phone numbers which are not your own.


• These rules are designed to protect everyone, and ensure that the site remains a place where people can browse the forums and post without fear of being judged or criticised. We hope that these rules will ensure the site runs smoothly. If you break these rules, we reserve the right to revoke your posting privileges.


• Any user whose posting privileges are revoked is subject to immediate ban if they are caught posting under another username. We do not like to have to revoke users, and do so only when all other forms of rational interaction have been exhausted. Because we do not take banning lightly, a banned user must prove her/his sincerity in wishing to rejoin the forum community as a considerate and helpful forum user. A revoked user must convince the Message Board Representative that s/he is fully prepared to comply with the board rules in all future forum use if s/he wishes to be welcomed back to the forums.


• Please do not use the IM system to pester people with unsolicited messages. If you receive any such messages please let a moderator or administrator know.


• If you are having technical problems with the forums, please contact an administrator.


• The above forum rules where applicable also apply to private messaging and instant messaging. Abuse of the private messaging system may lead to warnings (as above) and/or the revocation of private messaging.

If in doubt please contact the administrators and moderators by Email or Private Messaging with questions that's what they're here for and they won't mind. Please bear with us if our responses aren't immediate, while we will try and get back to you straight away there will inevitably be times when delays occur.