Please don’t report posts to point out that someone is wrong. That’s not (by itself) a rules violation.

Correction of errors or gaps in knowledge can and should be addressed in the course of a discussion 

A reminder that we do not delete accounts. You may choose to leave, and you might be shown the door, but your posts remain. We generally only remove posts from sight when there are rules violations involved. 

A reminder that Science News is for news - we expect a link to a news article, and a summary. If you can’t provide that, there’s an excellent chance your thread shouldn’t go there.

While staff appreciates a heads-up via Report Post when you spot a new member who posts like a potential spammer, or like a disruptive member you've encountered on another forum, our rules are designed to keep our standards on a level playing field. We hope you can see why we can't just ban someone on your say-so, and also hope you'll trust that these folks will reveal their agendas, or break enough rules, or otherwise self-limit their involvement on our site. 

If you must respond to obvious spammers, for the love of Zeus, don’t quote the spam link. You’re helping them by padding the SEO they seek with a second link, and since we’re going to ban them anyway, you’re just creating extra work for the mods because now we have to go and hide your post, too.

So not only aren’t you helping, you’re actively making things worse.

We would rather you just report the post, and beyond that, ignore it. 

A reminder that status updates are not to be used as a substitute for posting in the forums.

Please don’t respond to obvious spam. You aren’t going to shame them or reason with them.

Use the “report post” function to bring it to the attention if the moderators. 

It is not a rules violation to have someone disagree with you. The staff does not consider it to be “harassment” 

 

 

Reminder that status updates aren’t there for subjects that should be discussed in the forums. 

A reminder that the “report post” function should be used for suspected rules violations. 

”sounds like a bot” is not a rules violation. 

On 5/18/2023 at 11:57 AM, swansont said:

A reminder that the “report post” function should be used for suspected rules violations. 

”sounds like a bot” is not a rules violation. 

Re-upping this. Please stop reporting posts for allegedly being from bots.

Pointing out that some of your post didn’t violate the rules isn’t going to make us overlook the part that did.

When we close threads it’s because the OP has failed to follow the rules in some way(s), and we try to be clear as to the reasons.

This does not preclude anyone else from opening a thread on a similar topic that does not violate the rules (e.g. closed for lack of rigor or posting just a video? Go ahead and make a rigorous post in a new thread. Dangerous activity? No, since that would still violate the rules)  

Please don’t use the report post function, or PMs, to request we fix trivial typographic errors.

If you can no longer edit your post either live with the pain of having typed it’s instead of its (or whatever), or, if you must, quote yourself and respond with the correct version.

Most of the time people will know what you meant. If they don’t, they can ask for clarification.

I’m not sure what the motivation is to respond to obvious spam, but when you quote them, and include the link, you’re helping them do their damage. When we ban them their original posts are hidden, but not anything in the responses. It’s extra work to hide those posts, too, and if we don’t notice then the spam link persists.

A reminder that what happens on other sites stays on other sites, or at least out of here. Discussion should be about what’s posted here.