STICKY: The Rules! Please Read Before Posting - modified 19/07/2010

[gary]

You agree, through your use of this forum, that you will not post any material which is false, defamatory, inaccurate, abusive, vulgar, hateful, harassing, obscene, profane, sexually oriented, threatening, invasive of a person's privacy, adult material, or otherwise in violation of any International or United Kingdom law. You also agree not to post any copyrighted material (including photographs, images, audio, video and registered trademarks) unless you own the copyright or you have written consent from the owner of the copyrighted material. Spam, flooding, advertisements, chain letters, pyramid schemes, and solicitations are also forbidden on this forum. You agree not to post content that may be harmful to WISSL (t/a Trust in Widnes), its operations or performance. You agree not to post content that may be harmful to any other recognised supporters association, their operations or performance. You agree not to post messages that do not contribute to the messageboard in any substantial way, but are posted merely in an attempt to increase a user's message count or shock/annoy other users - this includes "trolling" of any nature. The forum contains a swear filter and you should not, though changes in letter spacing, the use of * to replace letters or by any other means, attempt to bypass this filter. This is to protect the junior members of the messageboard


Note that it is impossible for the staff or the owners of this forum to confirm the validity of posts. Please remember that we do not actively monitor the posted messages, and as such, are not responsible for the content contained within. We do not warrant the accuracy, completeness, or usefulness of any information presented. The posted messages express the views of the author, and not necessarily the views of this forum, its staff, its subsidiaries, or this forum's owner. Anyone who feels that a posted message is objectionable is encouraged to notify an administrator or moderator of this forum immediately. The staff and the owner of this forum reserve the right to remove objectionable content, within a reasonable time frame, if they determine that removal is necessary. This is a manual process, however, please realize that they may not be able to remove or edit particular messages immediately. This policy applies to member profile information as well.

You remain solely responsible for the content of your posted messages. Furthermore, you agree to indemnify and hold harmless the owners of this forum, any related websites to this forum, its staff, and its subsidiaries. The owners of this forum also reserve the right to reveal your identity (or any other related information collected on this service) in the event of a formal complaint or legal action arising from any situation caused by your use of this forum.

You have the ability, as you register, to choose your username. We advise that you keep the name appropriate. With this user account you are about to register, you agree to never give your password out to another person except an administrator, for your protection and for validity reasons. You also agree to NEVER use another person's account for any reason.  We also HIGHLY recommend you use a complex and unique password for your account, to prevent account theft.

After you register and login to this forum, you will be able to fill out a detailed profile. It is your responsibility to present clean and accurate information. Any information the forum owner or staff determines to be inaccurate or vulgar in nature will be removed, with or without prior notice. Appropriate sanctions may be applicable.

Please note that with each post, your IP address is recorded, in the event that you need to be banned from this forum or your ISP contacted. This will only happen in the event of a major violation of this agreement.

Also note that the software places a cookie, a text file containing bits of information (such as your username and password), in your browser's cache. This is ONLY used to keep you logged in/out. The software does not collect or send any other form of information to your computer.

The IT administrator for Trust in Widnes, and thus the final arbiter in all disputes shall be Trust in Widnes. Any complaints should be made to Trust in Widnes as a personal message or by email. If you want to report a problem, please email TIW on enquiries@trustinwidnes.com giving as much information as possible, including full screen contents of any relevant error messages.

Any messages, personal or public, may be deleted without notice for reasons of space management.

This messageboard is not affiliated to the Widnes Vikings and views expressed on here do not necessarily reflect those of Widnes Vikings, those of Trust in Widnes or those of the web space owner.

In your choice of username, you should not attempt to pass yourself off as any other user, individual, company, society or organisation. Avatars must be suitable for children to see. Anything deemed unsuitable is liable to immediate removal, along with the user.

You should always maintain a valid email address on your user record. Failure to do so may mean that you miss out on important messages. From time to time, users may be disabled and require enabling via a link in an email. The email address on your user record will be used for this.

These rules are subject to change at any time. Please check back from time to time to check that you are aware of any amendments. You should also take time to read announcements and stickies as they are posted by the moderators.

[LeedsViking]

A copy of the e-mail sent to all registered users e-mail addresses this morning:


Dear Messageboard Users
 
In order to preserve the integrity of the Trust in Widnes messageboard, we have decided to limit the number of adverts. No advertising of profit-making ventures is allowed unless otherwise permitted by the Trust in Widnes committee. Companies are always welcome to apply for corporate membership of the Trust to advertise their goods and services.
 
In addition, the advertising of non-profit ventures is now limited to Trust members only. Adverts for a service, goods, event or link not related to the Trust or its interests are liable to be deleted if posted by a user who is not a paying member of the Trust.
 
Please remember that membership fees allow the messageboard to continue, but while it is our intention to keep the messageboard open to anyone, we cannot allow members' enjoyment of their facility to be affected by too many advertisements.
 
We thank you for your co-operation in this.
 
The Trust in Widnes Committee


We trust that you will all understand the need for us to take these steps, and will support us in our efforts to keep this as THE premier rugby league messageboard on the internet.

[LeedsViking]

There has recently been a number of occasions when it has been necessary to remove some posts containing photographs; this is because any photograph that is added to a post as an attachment has to be uploaded onto the Trust in Widnes server, and can cause the messageboard to work more slowly.

With the increase in traffic we now have on the messageboard, we feel it is necessary to keep the server responding as quickly as possible, and as such we will be applying the following rules regarding the posting of photographs:

• Photographs can only be posted by way of a link to a third party website (e.g. Photobucket, Fotki, etc)
• Photographs that are posted by way of an attachment will be removed by a moderator
• Photographs must be kept to a reasonable size, anything considered too large will also be removed
• Photographs must not contain any image which is likely to cause offence to another board user
• Posts which "quote" a photograph will be removed

Please remember that just like any other web page, threads containing photographs will take longer to load in your web browser, and the slower your Internet connection the longer it will take!? To respect those users of the messageboard who do have slower Internet connections, any thread that has an excessive number of photographs is liable to be locked, or even removed.

By publishing these rules we hope that some of the confusion regarding the removal of photographs will be cleared up; and we trust that you will understand the need for us to enforce this.?

Above all else it is essential that we do not spoil the enjoyment of the number one messageboard in Rugby League for our members and guests.

[Trust in Widnes]

Update to the rules on the posting of material sourced elsewhere

All messageboard users are reminded that when posting material sourced from elsewhere; for example a news story from the Widnes Vikings official website, it is correct practice to post a link to the original source material; e.g.

Source:  http://www.widnesvikings.co.uk/news.php


Any future 'cut & paste' posts that do not contain this acknowledgement will be removed by the board moderation team.

Your cooperation is appreciated.

[LeedsViking]

Following discussions amongst the moderation team of the messageboard and the Trust in Widnes committee members we have decided to adopt a zero tolerance approach to some of the 'goings on' that have afflicted the messageboard in more recent times.

Members of the moderation team have been approached at just about all of the Vikings games this season by regular users of the messageboard wanting to voice their dissatisfaction with what they perceive to be a downturn in the allowed content of the forum.  After the discussions today we have decided that they are correct and that we must take a firmer line.

The biggest complaints are by far the increase in the number of 'personal battles' that this forum is playing host to, so from now onwards any moderator viewing a thread that sinks to the level of personal abuse, name calling, or petty bickering, will take action (NB, the usual sanction will be a 24 hour ban from the messageboard).  In the event that a moderator is online to step in as soon as an unacceptable post is made, the offending post(s) will be removed and the user(s) will face action immediately.  In the event that a sequence of posts have been made whilst the forum is unmoderated then the whole thread will simply be removed and appropriate action taken against those involved.  I apologise in advance to those users whose contribution to the thread hasn't transgressed, but it is too onerous a task for the moderator to try and strip out all offending posts from a lengthy thread, bearing in mind that they can often be quoted throughout a thread.

The second most frequent complaint is "messageboard chit-chat", in particular from some of our younger forum users who are posting banter between themselves on any number of threads.  There are any number of other internet outlets for this kind of banter, so in deference to the vast majority of messageboard users who are not 'in on the joke' these posts and threads will be treated in the same way as those mentioned above.


This approach is designed to draw a line in the sand... at Trust in Widnes we are very proud to operate such a popular messageboard, we are Vikings fans first and foremost and the vast majority of the content of this forum is great to be involved in.  We are absolutely delighted that our club will be playing in the elite Super League competition next season, and with that will invariably become an increasing awareness of the club and no doubt new fans who want to have their say on all things Widnes.  We want them to feel welcome to join us on this messageboard, we want this to be a place of (mostly) friendly discussion amongst fans of the greatest game on the planet, even if they are fans of other clubs, their differing viewpoint is often what sparks the best discussions.

Please take a few minutes to remind yourselves of the messageboard rules and just take a moment to consider others before you post.  It goes without saying that anyone who continually fails to accept this zero tolerance approach will leave the board administrators no real option but to remove their access.  Please don't let it get to that stage, let's strive to keep this messageboard a cut above the rest!


On behalf of the TiW Committee and Messageboard Admins & Moderators,

LeedsViking