R&M Forum code of conduct

This R&M Forum is available for any registered user to provide information or to offer an opinion on matters of local interest. The Forum is supervised by a team of volunteer Moderators who will be guided by the following considerations:

1. Advice to users

Choosing your username – you may choose to use your own name (which is encouraged), or to remain anonymous. Please do not choose a name which is that of any other real person, whether living or dead. The Moderators reserve the right to cancel a registration with a username which could be considered likely to cause offence.

Choosing your avatar – You may choose an avatar as a ‘logo’ for your contributions. This can be a small photo or symbol, but you must use a picture you have taken yourself or a copyright-free image.

Privacy – You are strongly advised not to include your own email address in any posting. The Forum allows you to use private messaging if you wish to respond to an individual.

2. Rules for acceptable behaviour

Adult content – Pornographic content or references to sites of an adult nature are not permitted.

Advertising items for sale – The Forum may not be used to advertise goods or services for sale or exchange.  Requests for recommended suppliers will be removed if they appear to be a covert form of advertising.  Replies to such requests should not be published, but should be sent via the private messaging system.

Bad language – Although many previously unacceptable terms have become a part of everyday conversation there are certain words which are universally acknowledged as being inappropriate. We will exercise our right to remove any posts that (in our opinion) contain such language.

Copyright infringement – Users must be careful not to infringe copyrights of any kind.

Libel, defamatory comment or personal remarks – Messages on the Forum are a ‘publication’, just like a letter to a newspaper. As with printed materials, the laws of libel apply – both to the author of the comments, and to the managers of the website. For our mutual protection, any material considered to be defamatory will be deleted. Comments relating to personal matters (eg the health or financial circumstances of a potentially identifiable individual) must also be avoided.

Offensive comment – Personal abuse, whether directed at a named individual or at someone who can be deemed ‘recognisable’, is not acceptable, and such posts will be removed. Discriminatory comment (eg of a racist or sexist nature) is of course unacceptable.  Facetious personal jibes can be taken as more offensive than the writer originally intended, and should be avoided. Irony is particularly difficult to convey in writing alone; in the absence of eye contact and body language it can easily be misinterpreted and hurtful.  Please review your message carefully before hitting the post button!

Political comment – We ask users to refrain from party political comment.

Religion – We do not permit posts or threads that seek to express or incite religious intolerance or to promote religious beliefs.

‘Trolling’ – is a practice sometimes adopted by people who wish to use online forums to be deliberately provocative. The moderators reserve the right to delete postings which appear to be of this nature.  Persistent offenders will have their registration cancelled.

The moderators will remove postings which deliberately take the thread off topic.

3. Conditions of use

If you contribute to the Forum you accept that:

• a decision made by the Moderators to delete or edit posts is final
• a user’s registration will be cancelled if an offender persists after a warning, but on the very rare occasions this proves necessary, the cancellation may be for an unlimited period
• you have read and understood our Disclaimer

The Moderators cannot be assumed to be ‘on line’ continuously, but they do receive an email each time there is a new posting. The site is checked at least once every day, and prompt action is taken if ever it becomes necessary.

Information about the web team and the moderators can be found here.

Radyr & Morganstown Web Team

Last revised: October 2016