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Forum Rules

Rules for the community forum.

Below are rules at Speedsolving.com, rules that apply throughout the entire site. It is very important that all users read and are familiar with these rules.

1. Be Civil, Be Respectful
Remember what your elementary school teachers have told you: “Do unto others as you’d have others do unto you.” This is especially true in an online environment: all you have to communicate is words and words alone. As a result, you will be judged on the quality and content of your posts – spend some thought into posting.

Some guidelines for this forum:

a. No Flaming or Trolling
Respect other users and try to contribute to a nice ambiance on the forum. No personal attacks, or provocation of other forum members. If you are being attacked or provoked, do not feel compelled to defend your honor here; report the offender to a moderator. See examples of Flaming/Trolling in the appendix section below.
b. Language and Content Expectations
Speedsolving.com is a family-friendly site. It is very important to always keep in mind that there are young children on this site. There is an automatic profanity censor; do not attempt to bypass the censor. When you’re manually censoring a word, be sure to censor it well, censoring one letter is not enough. If you are posting videos or links to sites that contain some profanity, be sure to write a warning above the video or link. Additionally, do not post content that is excessively vulgar, profane, graphic, or violent in nature. If you see such offensive content, report it.
c. One Account per Person

You are prohibited from having more than one account; multiple (‘alt’) accounts may be banned without warning. Infractions issued to alt accounts will be reissued to the corresponding primary accounts, in addition to other punishments. Do not create a new account to get around a ban or other punishment; these punishments will be extended or made permanent.

d. Regarding Backseat Moderation
If you notice someone breaking the rules, kindly tell inform them of the rules, and do it tactfully. If someone has already informed them, do not point it out again. Report the offending post if you must, but do not flame the poster; remember that notes about pointing out etiquette and rule violations are usually etiquette and rule violations themselves. Try to help other members, not hurt them.

e. Replying to posts
It is a good habit to use the Reply to Post and Multi–post feature when you’re replying to specific posts, other than the very first post of a thread. It helps make discussions easy to follow, makes it clear which post(s) you’re replying to, and allow those posts to be located via the  tool above most quotes. If you are replying to a very long post, be sure to shorten it, or hide it using spoiler tags. Additionally, you should avoid replying to embedded videos and images without unembedding or hiding them. You can do so by replacing the video/image with its link, or by placing the video/image in spoiler tags. Without doing so, some pages of threads will take much longer to load and to scroll through.

f. Signatures
You are free to write anything in your signatures, as long as they do not contain any inappropriate or hateful content. Additionally, signatures may not have spoiler tags, images, contain indents, and may not be more than three lines long.

2. Stay on Topic
Before posting a new thread, make sure that you are posting in the correct sub-forum – check the descriptions. Within a thread, do not derail the thread off-topic. Additionally:

a. No Spam
Spam refers to any posts or threads that do not contribute, do not belong, or are irrelevant in its posted location. Speedsolving.com has a zero-tolerance policy on spam. Spam of any sort will be deleted without warning. As a general guideline, ask yourself, “Would I want to see a thread/post like this if I were someone else?” Report it if you see it. See the Appendix for examples. If you realize that your thread is in an incorrect sub-forum, ask a moderator to move it.
b. Excessive Cross-posting
A cross-post is the posting of an article/thought/idea to more than one sub-forum/topic at a time, typically by copying and pasting a post to duplicate it across the forum. There are times when it is appropriate (e.g. Posting a comparison video of two puzzles in the two corresponding threads in the Puzzle Review subforum), but most of the time it is inappropriate. Threads should never be posted twice. If you are unsure whether a post should be posted in two separate threads, ask a moderator before you post.

c. Worthless Replying
Don’t reply to a post unless you have something of value to add to it. Replying with “+1” or “go search for it” is not allowed, as it does no good for the topic creator or the community. If you see this behavior and would like to respond to it, see: 1e. “Regarding Backseat Moderation”.

d. No Bumping Threads
Bumping your own topic for the sake of getting it to the top is not allowed. ‘Bumping’ your thread is allowed if you have something of value to add, however, consider editing the topic instead of adding a new post to it.

e. Additional Rules
Several subforums have additional rules, which you can find in their corresponding “Please Read Prior To Posting” Threads. The Announcements section also may announce new rules that are not mentioned on this page.

Please do not create “personal best” or “personal record” threads. There is an Accomplishment Thread where you can share your records with the community. Otherwise you can utilize your signature to post your records.

f. Search Function
Please use the search function before making a new thread. If you find an older thread that is similar to the one you wanted to create, please use that thread instead of creating a new topic. However, please look at the date that the original thread was posted (it may be quite old). If you plan to add information to an existing topic, please make sure you are aware of the age of the thread, and only reply to it if you have something of value to add to it.

3. No Advertising
Blatant advertising is rude and inappropriate. Additionally, the advertising of commercial sites, goods, or services unrelated to speedsolving is prohibited (exception: Off-Topic Discussion). Accounts that are created solely for advertising will be permanently banned.

Puzzle sellers and buyers may post in the Buy/Sell/Trade (‘BST’) forum. Be sure to read the BST rules before posting.

Appendices

A place for reference information.

Rule Enforcement – Rule Infractions:

The rules are enforced by an infraction system. If you break a rule, a moderator may give you an infraction or a warning. An infraction is a notification that you broke a rule, and is accompanied by infraction points. In most cases, these infractions will expire after a certain amount of time, depending on the nature and severity of the rule that was broken. A warning is similar to an infraction but does not add any infraction points to your profile.

If you receive enough active infraction points, you will be banned for a specified period of time.
5 Points – 1 day ban
10 points – 5 day ban

If you receive an infraction and believe it was unfair or unwarranted, you should discuss the matter with the moderator who issued the infraction.

Additionally, users who repeatedly violate these rules or are particularly disruptive may be temporarily or permanently banned from the site, at the discretion of a moderator.

If you notice another user breaking the rules, the best way to help is to use the Report Post function, available in below each post. This will alert the appropriate moderators to the issue so they can respond. Please do not respond to spam posts/posts you report – the moderators will take care of it, and it does no good if members try to resolve the issue.

Infractions:

Spam:

Spam, minor – 1 point, 5 days
Spam, major – 3 point, 14 days
Spam, excessive – Permanent ban
Multi-posting – 2 points, 7 days
Thread-necro – 2 points, 7 days

Inappropriate forum behavior:

Flaming, minor – 1 point, 5 days
Flaming – 2 points, 10 days
Trolling – 3 points, 14 days
Harassment – Permanent ban, subject to administrator’s discretion

Inappropriate content:

Censor dodging – 1 point, 5 days
Inappropriate content, mild – 1 point, 5 days
Inappropriate content, major – 3 points, 14 days
Explicit content or images – Permanent ban, subject to administrator’s discretion
Copyright Violation – 3 points, 14 days

Blatant Advertising:

Advertising violation, minor – 2 points, 5 days
Advertising violation, major – Permanent ban, subject to administrator’s discretion

Examples of Spam Posts and Threads

  • Threads with titles containing excessive characters/punctuation.
  • Posts with blatant disregard to spelling and grammar. This is a forum, not a chat room.
  • Threads that duplicate other, recent threads. Search for similar threads before posting.
  • Re-posts of posts/threads that were recently been closed or deleted; asking why they were closed or deleted. Direct these questions to the moderators via private message.
  • Re–posts of unapproved threads. If your thread is initially unapproved, and is not approved within 12 hours, contact a moderator.
  • Posts such as “this thread is going to get closed” or “this thread is in the wrong forum”
  • Image macro posts within constructive discussions. Memes are not allowed outside of meme threads.
  • Posts with excessive usage of emoticons.
  • Multiple short posts in a row. To add/update content to one of your posts, edit the post.
  • Posts that bump old threads without contributing anything new; only reply to old threads if adding something worthwhile.
  • Posts that reply to other posts that are clearly spam.

Examples of Flaming

  • Posts that only contain one of the following (or similar):
“OMG”
“LOL”
“GJ”
“Use the search function”
  • Posts that point out grammatical/spelling mistakes, usually in a hostile manner
  • Posts that insult another member or his/her background, religion, etc.

Also note that usage of profanity and/or the failure to turn off caps lock are fairly good indicators of flaming (in which case you should report the post anyway).

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