Rules
We encourage robust debate and we’re tolerant of dissenting views.
What we’re not prepared to accept are personal attacks, or tone or language that has the effect of excluding others. We are intolerant of people starting or continuing flamewars where there is little discussion or debate. Such comments may be deleted without warning or one of the alternatives below may be employed. The action taken is completely up to who takes it.
Attacking the blog site or attributing a mind to a machine is not allowed - see here for an explanation. You will usually get the sysop answering you, because he considers that those are comments directed at him personally.
The bar is high but there is a bar.
Banning
We don’t really want to ban anyone. If you’re borderline we’ll probably warn you first. If you’re a consistent repeat offender we reserve the right to ask you to ban yourself for a period.
If polite banning by the moderators is ineffective, then you may come to the sysop’s attention and get a permanent ban. There are a number of topics that are viewed as being self-evident attempts at martyrdom. Making comments on those topics will typically result in immediate and sometimes a permanent ban.
A partial list of these self-martyrdom offenses include:-
- Abusing the sysop or post writers on their own site. This is viewed as self-evident stupidity, and should be added as a category to the Darwin Awards.
- Describing the site as having ulterior motivations. When visiting a blog site it always pays to read the About pages before making a fool of yourself. Then you will know what the site is about. Failure to do so is just bad bad manners.
- Link-whoring when not in the context of the comment thread. We don’t have advertising, why should we allow you to advertise here?
Moderation
Moderation is largely used to control spam comments that do not get caught by the anti-spam tools. This means that you might get caught in it if you use some words, have an IP range that overlaps a spam source, or your IP comes from certain geographical regions.
Moderation may also be used if you get banned on a temporary basis and don’t do it voluntarily. The moderators will put you there as a reminder that you aren’t welcome.
Finally, the moderators may put you into moderation for what they consider is bad behaviour, while they get around to having a look at your patterns of behaviour.
If you get moderated and don’t have a good reason why, don’t get too alarmed. It is probably the spam trap. Usually your message will get approved shortly, but sometimes during weekends and overnight it may take a while.
Privacy
We do not disclose any information to third parties that you add to your profile that is not public on the blog. In particular your real name, and e-mail. Similarly if you are not logged in and enter a comment, we do not disclose the e-mail you enter on your message.
E-mail addresses are only used by the sysop or moderators if they need to contact you. This will usually be because of your behaviour or other peoples behaviour to you on the blog.
What you write in comments is public and will be visible to anyone who reads the site. That is far more than the number of people who comment.
