Leaving Neualtenburg

Any chance you could take a guess as to why at all? I'm busy catching up on the Neualt posts.. but thus far, I see no reason for a person leaving. Unless she supported the crashing of our sim. But I do not think that is the case.

Garnet... why are you leaving?

Pardon me. But I'll say what I want, where I want.

As a non-citizen, you have no right to our group forums. You can be edited, and your posts could be deleted if our SC (forum moderators) deem so. So actually, I'm right and you are wrong.

Say what you wish. However, you will recieve no pardon from me.

Pendari,

this does not work (-> is not allowed) as long as this is a public forum.

Mel

Hehe ... this is starting to be fun!

Mel

It certainly is allowed. Neualt's government aside, on the Group Forums (which are only created for a group if they have more than 15 members), moderators are added from that group (the officers) by the Lindens. And those group forum moderators can edit or delete any post they wish within *their* group forum.

Since we have a government run group, Ulrika does the right thing and tries to find out what us citizens want as far as rules goes so that the SC can do their job. The SC does not *have* to ask us though. We just happen to have good SC members.

well... Garnet was suspsiciously "Away" when the quake hit Neualtenburg, and she has been hitting the bottle pretty hard lately, so I wouldn't be surprised if she had something to do with it.

I think maybe she is just taking off before the cops show up at her door.
Run Gypsy, run!

Sorry, the fact that moderators can do something does not necessarily mean that RL laws allow this. And freedom of speech is something that we all should fight for.

Hey, don´t take SL and Nburg *too* serious.

If you wanted moderators to edit and delete posts, you would have to restrict it to a certain group of people that can write *and* read the posts. In this case the forum would be private and moderators are allowed to delete any post without further notification ... normally they would not do that, because this would mean that the forum is dead more or less. I have some experience with that kind of behaviour.

Regarding Nburg: I fully understand this project (I hope ) and yes, citizens should follow the rules as much as possible.

Mel

hehe.. Telling me not to take SL and Nburg *too* serious is a waste of time. Only because I do take it very seriously. But that's just me!

And while I agree that we should fight for speech freedoms, technically you are incorrect when you state that RL laws do not allow for the type of moderation I described.

The SL forums are NOT public forums. They are owned by a private business, and therefore can be moderated and run however the company chooses. They do not have to allow us a voice at all if they do not wish to. Thankfully Linden Lab is a great company and they allow us a lot more freedom than many other private forums. Even though sometimes I think they are more strict than I would be if it were my company.

And this is where you are wrong. As long as everybody can read the posts here, it falls under normal RL laws regarding freedom of speech. This is bad for whoever runs this forum but it is how it is.

Well, on the other hand, I have to be careful, as the laws in US might be different from the ones in Germany. Maybe we have more freedom of speech over here.

Mel

That is most likely the case!

Since Linden Lab is a US based company, they fall under US laws. And in the US, if a company has a forum, there are no laws that say a company must allow free speech on their forums.

And here are the SL Forum Guidelines (which clearly show how much they can moderate)


Second Life® Forum General Guidelines

Welcome to the Second Life Forums! These forums are here for you, the Residents of Second Life, to discuss your ideas, questions, and projects and to share what you’ve learned. The boards have been divided up into several sections:

Linden Forums: Find announcements and news, information, economic and land statistics, and discussions with Linden Lab about new features in development.
Classified Forums: Post announcements when you have a product, service or property to sell or rent, or when you need some help with a project.
Discussion Forums: Share your ideas, ask questions, debate policies, and advocate new features with other members of the community.
Group Forums: Create a special place for your group discussions.
Forum Archive: Search past forum discussions.

Purpose
The purpose of the Second Life Forums is to promote discussion and education about Second Life. We believe in an honest and open free exchange of ideas, and in always maintaining a respect for the opinions and positions of other people.

Moderation Policy
Linden Lab provides these forums in the belief that promoting discourse and the sharing of ideas leads to a stronger, better informed community. We allow full freedom of expression, within the limits of the Community Standards. Generally we will not delete whole threads, except in special circumstances as noted below. Any editing or locking of threads will be accompanied by an explanation, to make our moderation decisions as transparent to Residents as possible.

Specifically:

Hate speech and revelation of other people’s real life information are prohibited and are grounds for suspension or removal from the forums and Second Life. These threads will be deleted.

Self-regulation of forum posts is the ideal. Posts should conform with the Terms of Service and the Community Standards. However, moderators will have the option of:


editing aggressively offensive personal attacks to remove those statements that violate the community standards (with an accompanying statement explaining the violation and reason for edit), please note language, such as "fraud, liar, cheater, griefer, troller, jerk, scam artist" etc is strongly discouraged, but will not be removed.

locking threads with explanation in extreme cases (e.g. although posts have been edited and the parties asked to cease, the attacks don’t stop. There’s no obvious constructive discussion going on).

A system of warnings and suspensions (see description below) will ensure that Residents who repeatedly violate the CS in the forums lose their posting privileges.

Your Role In Helping To Moderate The Forums
There’s a significant amount of traffic to the Second Life Forums, and it isn’t possible for us to read every thread. You can help keep the forums constructive and useful with the following tools:

Ratings – Each thread can be rated from 1 to 5. If you feel a thread is particularly interesting or helpful, rate it 5. Those threads that are posted with the intention of inciting negative response (see Flaming, Spamming, Trolling below) should be rated 1. Your ratings will help others know what to expect, and what to spend time with.

Report posts – If you see a post that you think violates the Community Standards, is posted in the wrong forum, or in some way requires review, please report it. We’ll take a look at it and will take any action necessary.

Ignoring – If for some reason you and another individual never see eye-to-eye you can choose to ignore that individual rather than respond negatively. To ignore people, click on the name of the person who posted the message. This will pull up their public information. Select "add to ignore list" at the bottom of their panel to ignore all posts by that person.

Discipline

Be respectful. Please challenge opinions, state your own and enjoy the discussion, but do not cross the line into personal attacks and insults because you will risk having your Second Life account suspended or banned. We believe that in-world and forum behavior are linked and behavior carries across the boundary. This means if you are suspended or banned in-world you are also suspended or banned from the forums, and vice versa, if your account is suspended or banned from the SL Forums, it will also be suspended or banned from in-world. Violations are evaluated on a case-by-case basis depending on the severity of the offense and past history of violations. The following types of disciplinary action are possible remedies for inappropriate posts.


Deletion/editing of offending material: The material that violated the rules may be edited or deleted without warning. In addition, threads that are no longer productive may be locked from further posting.


Informal warning: If the offense is not severe enough to warrant a formal warning, an informal warning may be issued. An informal warning is a private correspondence between Linden Lab and the violator, advising the violator of the offense and what (s)he can do to correct it.


Formal warning: If the offense is severe enough or an informal warning has already been issued, Linden Lab may issue a formal warning. The formal warning becomes a permanent part of the poster’s record. Several warnings can result in suspension or banning of your account.


Suspension: A suspension is the temporary deactivation of a violator’s posting privileges from the Second Life Forums and from in-world activities.


Ban: A ban is the permanent deactivation of the violator’s account with the Second Life Forums and from in-world activities.

Alternate Account Abuse: When an account is suspended from the SL Forums, alternate account misuse will cause an increase in suspension time for both accounts. For instance, if Jane SecondLifer is suspended from the forums for three days and comes back to the forums on the second day of her suspension as an alt and breaks the Community Standards again, both accounts will be suspended from the SL Forums for seven more days. Every effort will be made to take into consideration the general feeling of the forum, but Linden Lab has the final say.

Recourse: If Linden Lab takes disciplinary action against you that you believe was unfair or inconsistent, you may appeal the decision. An appeal is an e-mail or private message explaining your situation and why you believe you should not have been disciplined. Appeals must be sent via e-mail only to [email]abuse@secondlife.com[/email], and must follow this appeals procedure, or they will not be considered. You may submit only one appeal per disciplinary action.

Basic Forum Policies and Etiquette

Private discussions – the forums are a public area for the Second Life community’s use. Individuals who have a dispute with each other have other channels of communication to discuss their differences or communicate – private messaging, IM within Second Life, or chatting within Second Life. Also, threads that are addressed to a single individual or group are inappropriate on the forums, this includes slander or "naming names" in a posts title, starting polls about a particular resident or group, etc.

Think before you post – sometimes in the heat of a passionate discussion you may be tempted to say something that on reflection you will regret. If your words do more harm to the community than they might give you pleasure in the short term, reconsider posting.

Flaming, Spamming, Trolling – Flaming (posting a message that is intended to incite anger or directly attack a person or persons), Spamming (multiple posts of the same topic or discussion), and Trolling (a post with an intentionally contrary opinion written with the intent of inciting or getting argumentative opinions) are strongly discouraged. If you think your post might be over-reactive, or that it might fall into one of these definitions, please reconsider posting.

Reposting – If a moderator removes your post, do not repost it elsewhere. Do not repost threads that have been locked or deleted and do not repost content that has been edited or deleted by a moderator. Furthermore, please do not post a "why did my post get removed" post. Send any further discussion regarding post removals to [email]abuse@lindenlab.com[/email].

Post in appropriate places, for appropriate reasons – The forums are split into separate topics. Please do not post discussions into forums that are clearly designed for other discussions.

Advertising - Advertising is not allowed on the forums. Posts containing Spam, real-world commercial advertisements, chain letters, pyramid schemes, and solicitations are expressly forbidden. Also, please do not post any affiliate or referral links, or post anything asking for a referral. Such posts will be subject to removal. This includes using the forum private message system to spam other members.
More Information: You may also be interested in reading more about Netiquette - "Netiquette" is network etiquette, the do's and don'ts of online communication. Read more about the Core Rules of Netiquette here.

Group Forums
To request a Group Forum, first make sure your SL Group has at least 20 members, then send an email to [email]groups@secondlife.com[/email] with your SL name, group name and the name of 2 group members who will be moderating the group forum. Please note, Group Forums which go unused may be deleted.

Found here: /invalid_link.html

Come on, writing down rules does not mean that they are valid!

Mel

I'm not sure what the laws in Germany are, but as I understand it over here, freedom of speech may exist in internet forums but so does freedom to delete, ban, etc. No one has an inherent right to post to an internet forum.

My personal guidelines on freedom of speech within the N'burg forum as moderator is that free expressions is unrestricted as long as that expression does not harm another individual (being upset is not harm).

Thus, one could say that they don't care for the things that a person is saying but one could not threaten them in retaliation for the things they say. Someone could question whether one should make the kinds of posts they do outside the N'burg forum but one could not invite people to crash the sim.

Thus, nothing is off limits -- it's just the way one says it that's off limits.

~Ulrika~