Hello there, Gregorius here

So I was thinking about Guidelines and Stuff. All I really care about is just that people are at least somewhat decent and both use and understand common sense, and try to be nice to others.

But here is some good Guidelines I came up with:

0. I always have the last say, just in case. But I also try to adhere to the other Guidelines I made up.

1. Just try to be nice to everyone and don’t spread hate about anyone.

2. Don’t bring up random Drama, nor try to make up Drama either.

3. Avoid talking about Politics, Religion or similar bad real life things, this is a place for fun! I already don’t like it when I have to talk about laws that may impact our open and free Forum negatively.

4. Intellectual Property is not something that should be brought up between two Users of this place. Everything that gets posted by you in here should be free to use, modify, share and redistribute for everyone else who posts their version of it in here, just like how OpenSource, Freedom and Creative Commons work, but constrained to within the Forums. (This part of the Guideline does not apply to Minecraft Mods). Also do note that some stuff might be licensed GPL or LGPL so it’s not “just” limited to the Forums in those cases. I just dont like people complaining about their work being “stolen” just because someone had a good reason to take it, modify it and re-release it. That’s why everything Mechaenetia related is licensed GPLv3.

5. Logos and Names of Stuff are there for identifying their original Creator(s)/Project(s), so at least change the Name and Logo meaningfully, when you copy someone else’s work, even if it’s just a small change.

This first Part is what really matters, but the Discourse Default below is a good read none-the-less.

This is a Civilized Place for Public Discussion

Please treat this discussion forum with the same respect you would a public park. We, too, are a shared community resource — a place to share skills, knowledge and interests through ongoing conversation.

These are not hard and fast rules, merely guidelines to aid the human judgment of our community and keep this a clean and well-lighted place for civilized public discourse.

Improve the Discussion

Help us make this a great place for discussion by always working to improve the discussion in some way, however small. If you are not sure your post adds to the conversation, think over what you want to say and try again later.

The topics discussed here matter to us, and we want you to act as if they matter to you, too. Be respectful of the topics and the people discussing them, even if you disagree with some of what is being said.

One way to improve the discussion is by discovering ones that are already happening. Spend time browsing the topics here before replying or starting your own, and you’ll have a better chance of meeting others who share your interests.

Be Agreeable, Even When You Disagree

You may wish to respond to something by disagreeing with it. That’s fine. But remember to criticize ideas, not people. Please avoid:

• Name-calling
• Ad hominem attacks
• Responding to a post’s tone instead of its actual content
• Knee-jerk contradiction

Instead, provide reasoned counter-arguments that improve the conversation.

Your Participation Counts

The conversations we have here set the tone for every new arrival. Help us influence the future of this community by choosing to engage in discussions that make this forum an interesting place to be — and avoiding those that do not.

Discourse provides tools that enable the community to collectively identify the best (and worst) contributions: bookmarks, likes, flags, replies, edits, and so forth. Use these tools to improve your own experience, and everyone else’s, too.

Let’s leave our community better than we found it.

If You See a Problem, Flag It

Moderators have special authority; they are responsible for this forum. But so are you. With your help, moderators can be community facilitators, not just janitors or police.

When you see bad behavior, don’t reply. It encourages the bad behavior by acknowledging it, consumes your energy, and wastes everyone’s time. Just flag it. If enough flags accrue, action will be taken, either automatically or by moderator intervention.

In order to maintain our community, moderators reserve the right to remove any content and any user account for any reason at any time. Moderators do not preview new posts; the moderators and site operators take no responsibility for any content posted by the community.

Always Be Civil

Nothing sabotages a healthy conversation like rudeness:

• Be civil. Don’t post anything that a reasonable person would consider offensive, abusive, or hate speech.
• Keep it clean. Don’t post anything obscene or sexually explicit.
• Respect each other. Don’t harass or grief anyone, impersonate people, or expose their private information.
• Respect our forum. Don’t post spam or otherwise vandalize the forum.

These are not concrete terms with precise definitions — avoid even the appearance of any of these things. If you’re unsure, ask yourself how you would feel if your post was featured on the front page of the New York Times.

This is a public forum, and search engines index these discussions. Keep the language, links, and images safe for family and friends.

Keep It Tidy

Make the effort to put things in the right place, so that we can spend more time discussing and less cleaning up. So:

• Don’t start a topic in the wrong category.
• Don’t cross-post the same thing in multiple topics.
• Don’t post no-content replies.
• Don’t divert a topic by changing it midstream.
• Don’t sign your posts — every post has your profile information attached to it.

Rather than posting “+1” or “Agreed”, use the Like button. Rather than taking an existing topic in a radically different direction, use Reply as a Linked Topic.

Post Only Your Own Stuff

You may not post anything digital that belongs to someone else without permission. You may not post descriptions of, links to, or methods for stealing someone’s intellectual property (software, video, audio, images), or for breaking any other law.

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