[MP-Ryan]

There are rules to this thread:
1.  If you derail it, you will be tied to the rails and run over by the community train.
2.  If you disrupt the discussion, you will be ejected from it.
3.  All feedback is to be constructive - simply posting you don't like something and not explaining why will result in the rail treatment in point #1.

Current version (admins or myself will update the text below based on suggested changes.  This first post will be the consolidated version).

The Rules

HLP is a large community with diverse views from all points on the political, social, and spiritual spectra.  While we may disagree on certain issues, a core HLP value is that we will be respectful of one another when discussing them.  Being respectful means that you debate the arguments, and you don't attack the person making them; you contribute meaningfully to discussion, and do not disrupt it for others.  This also means that racism, homophobic language, sexism, personal attacks, and harassment are behaviours that can earn you an immediate ban.  All warnings, temporary restrictions, and bans are at the discretion of the moderating team, based on the respect principle.  HLP's moderators will strive to intervene early to correct unacceptable behaviour instead of resorting to immediate formal actions; if you are the subject of a warning, this is an opportunity to change your behaviour and learn from it.

The games and mods here on HLP were made by people willing to give up massive amounts of their free time, often over the course of several years, in order to provide people with something to play. This can only happen when people are willing to be giving. Giving of their time to make games. Giving of the models, graphics and code they make. Giving of their expertise in teaching people how to do what they do. The worst community members just take what they're given and then complain about what they were given for free. The best community members are the ones who are willing to give back. Even if you haven't got any game design skills you can still give back. You can still tell people what worked and what didn't. If you find a bug you can give up a few hours to help the person who spent years making the game you're playing ensure that the next person doesn't have the same problem.

The discussion in the off-topic areas are also only productive because of members who also give up their free time to participate.  HLP has many passionate and often highly-educated members.  Please don't take our membership for granted.  Making any areas of the forums hostile places, and especially the truly optional areas, will merely eliminate them.

This community lives or dies on ability of its members to be respectful toward each other, and for this reason, this is the foremost rule on HLP.  Finally, posting activities which are illegal in most democratic countries (e.g. warez / piracy / phishing / spam) or content that is generally unacceptable for consumption in public (e.g. pornography) are also not permitted.

In summary: before hitting that post key, ask yourself "Is this post worth posting? Does it actually add anything significant to the discussion? Is it something the other people discussing this issue will want to read? Is it an attempt to explain your point of view or just an attempt to show why you're right? Will it antagonize somebody else simply because I'm annoyed?"  If your answers aren't going to make this a more enjoyable place to visit for everyone, perhaps you should edit that post one more time.

Helpful Tips and Reminders

- HLP has a 'Report Post' Function.  In FreeSpace terms, think of this as "Call Support."  When you have a problem with a post or thread, use this function to bring it to the attention of the HLP staff.

- Criticism is a valuable part of the creative process, but please remember that creators can't work without motivation, and criticism usually stings. Try to be compassionate and constructive when providing feedback - think of the process as a collaboration, working together to build something better. It's okay to say 'this doesn't work for me', but try to point to things you liked as well and offer a path forward. Conversely, please value thoughtful feedback you receive, even when you decide not to act on it.

- Unless a post violates the guidelines, it is freely made.  The member has a right to say it, and your right is to engage with and debate it or ignore it.  Your right is not to try to suppress it and advocate for its removal.  Conversely, posts which aren't meaningful or otherwise useful - in short, noise - serve no purpose and are heavily discouraged, particularly in the mod-specific forums.  Stream of consciousness posting (e.g. a forum-based Facebook/Twitter page) is noise; there are dedicated threads for these types of posts, please use them.

- HLP is not the place for you to bend all discussions toward a particular item of your focus to the detriment of everyone else (don't bring your soap-box to every thread). Bumping ancient threads without a meaningful contribution to them, double-posting, or spamming multiple threads with the same question or comment are also frowned upon.

- Off-topic forums will generally have more latitude given by moderators than will the project or mod-specific forums, as the latter exist exclusively to serve those projects, and disruption has greater negative effects there; however, this does not mean the off-topic areas are a free-for-all where the rules may be flaunted.

- The HLP staff have a variety of technical moderation tools which they can and will use to improve the forum environment should informal reminders prove inadequate to deal with you.  Follow the guidelines and don't become subject to one of them.  Among the more common tools are:  Warning, Moderated (posts require approval), Muted (read only access), Ban (temporary or permanent), Monkeyed (restricts you to projects of which you are a member), and Political Prisoner (a ban from General Discussion).  There are more creative options.  Don't be a test subject.

[MP-Ryan]

First suggestion:
1.  Guidelines are absent a prohibition on illegal/problematic activities - e.g. warez, porn (add to this list).
2.  While this should go without saying, some sites do permit this sort of thing, so an express prohibition is a good idea.
3.  Add the following text instead of the last line:

This community lives or dies on ability of its members to be nice to each other, and for this reason, this is the foremost rule on HLP.  Finally, posting activities which are illegal in most democratic countries (e.g. warez / piracy / phishing / spam) or content that is generally unacceptable for consumption in public (e.g. pornography) are also not permitted.

Any issues or additions?

[MP-Ryan]

Another item for discussion - there are a few salient points in the current guidelines stickied at the top of the Site Support board that are likely worth retaining - notes about the report post function, "stream of consciousness posting," etc.  That sort of thing falls more under the category of "good to know" than "rules," so I'd be curious to see how they are best incorporated.  Similarly, the various formal moderation tools wouldn't hurt as an FYI either.

There are also things from that list that I personally think should be ousted - the prohibition on community moderation being one of them (see the other hot thread in site support for those thoughts in detail).

It would be useful to gauge general reaction on these particular items.  My suggestion, to be added under the quoted guidelines in the first post:

Points to Keep in Mind:

- HLP has a 'Report Post' Function.  In FreeSpace terms, think of this as "Call Support."  When you have a problem with a post or thread, use this function.

- Unless a post violates the guidelines, it is freely made.  The member has a right to say it, and your right is to engage with and debate it or ignore it.  Your right is not to try to suppress it and advocate for its removal.  Conversely, posts which aren't meaningful or otherwise useful - in short, noise - serve no purpose and are heavily discouraged, particularly in the mod-specific forums.  If your post is more suitable to a YouTube/Facebook/Twitter/MySpace comment than a conversation you would have with other adults, rethink it.

- Stream of consciousness posting (e.g. a forum-based Facebook/Twitter page) is noise; there are dedicated threads for these types of posts, please use them.  Similarly, HLP is not the place for you to bend all discussions toward a particular item of your focus to the detriment of everyone else (don't bring your soap-box to every thread).

- The HLP staff have a variety of technical moderation tools which they can and will use to improve the forum environment should informal reminders prove inadequate to deal with you.  Follow the guidelines and don't become subject to one of them.  Among the more common tools are:  Warning, Moderated (posts require approval), Muted (read only access), Ban (temporary or permanent), Monkeyed (restricts you to projects of which you are a member), and Political Prisoner (a ban from General Discussion).  There are more creative options.  Don't be a test subject.

[zookeeper]

I think it's a bad idea idea for rules to state that you don't even need to be polite, so I'd suggest removing the "or even always be polite" part.

[karajorma]

Maybe change that to say that there is no need to be overly polite.

[Scotty]

I likewise think it's a bad idea to codify the concept of quote chain argumentation.

[MP-Ryan]

Maybe change that to say that there is no need to be overly polite.

Done.

Also, see update two posts up where I consolidated some of the existing guidelines.

[MP-Ryan]

I likewise think it's a bad idea to codify the concept of quote chain argumentation.

Sorry, where are you seeing that?

[Scotty]

There are rules to this thread:  If you don't like a provision or have a suggestion as to a modification, you must:
1.  Quote the lines you take issue with.
2.  Brief description as to why you take issue with them ("Waa waa i don't like it" does NOT count)
3.  Post suggested revision to the text.

Hmmm, my mistake.  I misread this as your intent with all disagreement.

[The Dagger]

Another item for discussion - there are a few salient points in the current guidelines stickied at the top of the Site Support board that are likely worth retaining - notes about the report post function, "stream of consciousness posting," etc.  That sort of thing falls more under the category of "good to know" than "rules," so I'd be curious to see how they are best incorporated.  Similarly, the various formal moderation tools wouldn't hurt as an FYI either.

You could add bumping old threads and double-posting to the list of things not to do.

[MP-Ryan]

Another item for discussion - there are a few salient points in the current guidelines stickied at the top of the Site Support board that are likely worth retaining - notes about the report post function, "stream of consciousness posting," etc.  That sort of thing falls more under the category of "good to know" than "rules," so I'd be curious to see how they are best incorporated.  Similarly, the various formal moderation tools wouldn't hurt as an FYI either.

You could add bumping old threads and double-posting to the list of things not to do.

Done.  And rolled in the other changes since no one has objected to them yet.

[General Battuta]

This seems pretty good. I might add something explicit about criticism:

Criticism is a valuable part of the creative process, but please remember that creators can't work without motivation, and criticism usually stings. Try to be compassionate and constructive when providing feedback - think of the process as a collaboration, working together to build something better. It's okay to say 'this doesn't work for me', but try to point to things you liked as well and offer a path forward. Conversely, please value thoughtful feedback you receive, even when you decide not to act on it.

[zookeeper]

I'd clarify "Bumping ancient threads" somehow by stating that bumping is verboten only when you're not actually adding anything new and relevant to the discussion. For example bumping old threads about specific features or models or whatever can be a perfectly legitimate thing to do in many circumstances, whereas bumping just to drop a comment isn't.

[MP-Ryan]

This seems pretty good. I might add something explicit about criticism:

Criticism is a valuable part of the creative process, but please remember that creators can't work without motivation, and criticism usually stings. Try to be compassionate and constructive when providing feedback - think of the process as a collaboration, working together to build something better. It's okay to say 'this doesn't work for me', but try to point to things you liked as well and offer a path forward. Conversely, please value thoughtful feedback you receive, even when you decide not to act on it.

My concern, as with the original discussion on this back in June, is that we end up with a massive set of guidelines.  I'd be hesitant about including nice to haves in the rules, so perhaps this should be filed under "Points to Keep in Mind" which can be separated by a line or something from the main guidelines.  The main guidelines should be short and to the point so people frickin' read them.

[MP-Ryan]

Rolled in the latest suggestions, separated rules from tips by a heading.

[niffiwan]

I'd clarify "Bumping ancient threads" somehow by stating that bumping is verboten only when you're not actually adding anything new and relevant to the discussion. For example bumping old threads about specific features or models or whatever can be a perfectly legitimate thing to do in many circumstances, whereas bumping just to drop a comment isn't.

I also believe that campaign release threads are somewhat excluded from the "don't bump old threads" rule?

Scratch that, I missed the line in the OP re: "...meaningful contribution...", that's more concise == better.

[MP-Ryan]

I'd clarify "Bumping ancient threads" somehow by stating that bumping is verboten only when you're not actually adding anything new and relevant to the discussion. For example bumping old threads about specific features or models or whatever can be a perfectly legitimate thing to do in many circumstances, whereas bumping just to drop a comment isn't.

I also believe that campaign release threads are somewhat excluded from the "don't bump old threads" rule?

Yeah, I tweaked that line.  We don't need to be too specific on exceptions, though.

[karajorma]

Here's something I already had written last time which was meant to deal with the High Maxs of this world.

Finally ask yourself one last question before hitting that post key "Is this post worth posting? Does it actually add anything significant to the discussion? Is it something the other people discussing this issue will want to read? Is it an attempt to explain your point of view or just an attempt to show why you're right? Will it antagonise somebody else simply because you're annoyed?

If your answers aren't going to make this a more enjoyable place to visit for everyone, perhaps you should edit that post one more time.

[MP-Ryan]

Also added to the Tips section.

Everyone like the wording of what we have in the OP so far?  Tweaks?  Modifications?  Hatred?  Anyone?  Bueller?

[niffiwan]

I like most of it.  The only comment I currently have is that there 2 points seem to have some overlap.  In the interests of conciseness could they be combined or have redundant info removed?

- Unless a post violates the guidelines, it is freely made.  The member has a right to say it, and your right is to engage with and debate it or ignore it.  Your right is not to try to suppress it and advocate for its removal.  Conversely, posts which aren't meaningful or otherwise useful - in short, noise - serve no purpose and are heavily discouraged, particularly in the mod-specific forums.  If your post is more suitable to a YouTube/Facebook/Twitter/MySpace comment than a conversation you would have with other adults, rethink it.

...

- Stream of consciousness posting (e.g. a forum-based Facebook/Twitter page) is noise; there are dedicated threads for these types of posts, please use them.  Similarly, HLP is not the place for you to bend all discussions toward a particular item of your focus to the detriment of everyone else (don't bring your soap-box to every thread).  Bumping ancient threads without a meaningful contribution to them, double-posting, or spamming multiple threads with the same question or comment are also frowned upon.

...

How about something like this?

- Unless a post violates the guidelines, it is freely made.  The member has a right to say it, and your right is to engage with and debate it or ignore it.  Your right is not to try to suppress it and advocate for its removal.  Conversely, posts which aren't meaningful or otherwise useful - in short, noise - serve no purpose and are heavily discouraged, particularly in the mod-specific forums.  Stream of consciousness posting (e.g. a forum-based Facebook/Twitter page) is noise; there are dedicated threads for these types of posts, please use them.

- HLP is not the place for you to bend all discussions toward a particular item of your focus to the detriment of everyone else (don't bring your soap-box to every thread). Bumping ancient threads without a meaningful contribution to them, double-posting, or spamming multiple threads with the same question or comment are also frowned upon.

...