MCEBuddy Forums - Code of Conduct

Your use of the MCEBuddy Forums constitutes acceptance and agreement to our Forum Code of Conduct, these rules set the posting standards applicable to all members. If you violate the Code of Conduct, we reserve the right to terminate your account without prior notice. We prefer to advise users of inappropriate behaviour, however, flagrant and repeated violations will result in an immediate ban. Our failure to enforce this policy, for whatever reason, shall not be construed as a waiver of our right to do so at any time.

We created this Code of Conduct to provide a basic understanding of what's allowed and not allowed in our forums. The following are guidelines for the establishment and enforcement of our code.

* Ensure a friendly atmosphere to forum members and our visitors.
* Ensure the privacy of our members and that of others
* Comply with existing laws
* Encourage responsible use of our forums and discourage activities which disrupt our community and reduce the value of our services to our members and our visitors.
* Encourage freedom of expression and exchange of information in a mature and responsible manner.
* Avoid turning our forums into an advertising billboard whereby important and sought after content cannot be easily located due to members involved in commercial ventures seeking only to post in order to place advertisements and referrals without making any attempt to provide tangible support or to advance the needs of our community.

Whilst we are committed to the principles of free speech, certain activities may be damaging to the resources of the MCEBuddy Community and cannot be permitted under the guise of free speech. The resources of MCEBuddy Community are limited, and abuse of these resources by any user has a negative impact on the entire community.

As a member of our community, you must participate responsibly. If you have any questions regarding our code, please contact the administrator via email.

The following activities constitute violations of our Code of Conduct.

1. Forum Security

The following actions are strictly prohibited:

* Accessing, or attempting to access, the accounts of other users
* Exploiting, or attempting to exploit, bugs, vulnerabilities, or loopholes; whether they are disclosed or undisclosed
* Penetrating, or attempting to penetrate, security measures of MCEBuddy Community's software or hardware, or electronic communications system

Any intrusion will subject your forum account to immediate termination, regardless of whether or not the intrusion results in the corruption, loss, or theft of data

2. Spamming

There are specific areas of the forum designated as an advertising areas, as a result, you may not spam or engage in commercial advertising in any other area of the forums. Spam includes, but is not limited to the following:

* Excessive off-topic threads
* Posting nonsensical messages
* "Flooding" the forum with similar meaning messages
* Post-Count farming
* Unsolicited advertising via private message or email
* Messages without content
* Repeated posting with constant referrals to other website(s) with no purpose other than the promotion of that website.
* Fraudulent activity (Pyramid schemes, chain letters, etc.)

2.1 Advertising

a) Commercial entities who attempt to advertise their products, prices or services within post content will have their post edited, the commercial content removed and be asked to avoid the activity, a second breach will result in the poster's account being suspended for thirty (30) days and continued disregard of this rule will result in termination of the user's account.

b) Advertising is defined as direct or indirect reference(s) to commercial products or services within the body of a post or by private message/email by the owner of, or any person associated with the product or service, and where such reference is in the form of unsolicited information or in response to a question about a product or service or by reference to a vendor's commercial website through the use of hyperlink(s).

c) Members not associated with a commercial product are free to point to, refer to, recommend or warn against a product's use on the basis that they are or have been a legitimate consumer of that product or are able to point to reference material in support of their assertions. Any member who tries to appear un-associated with a commercial product but who is found, through the use of duplicate IP referencing or other means as required, or who is deemed by management to be repeatedly referring to and/or promoting said product, service or website, will be considered as being involved in commercial advertising, as a result, post content and applicable disciplinary action will be subject to the conditions detailed in 2.1 (a)

3. Piracy, Copyright Material, Cracks and Product Keys

"Copyright Material" is any material protected by legally recognised copyright; "Piracy" is the illegal copying of software or any material subject to copyright; "Cracks" are programs that disable copy-protection technology; a "Key" is a combination of numbers and letters that is required for software installation.

You may not request, distribute, encourage, discuss, link to, or post in support of activities involving pirated software, cracks or product keys or the supply, exchange or distribution of any copyright material including TV recordings. Doing so may result in the termination of your account without notice. In addition, the following are grounds for moderator action on your post and/or account:

* Seeking help to create cracks.
* Seeking missing files that are supplied with installation CD(s)
* Admitting to being in possession of pirated software.
* Admitting to being involved in the distribution of pirated software, cracks and product keys.
* Requesting or discussing the trade, sale, exchange or supply of any copyrighted material including (but not limited) to TV recordings, DVDs, movies, music, software etc.
* Promote the identification of torrents sources, torrent content or torrent exchange.
* Provide or request login details for restricted websites.

Exceptions may be made on a case-by-case basis at the discretion of our forum administration.

4. Forgery or impersonation

Attempting to impersonate any person, including staff, using forged headers, instant messenger names, similar usernames in an effort to deceive or mislead is prohibited.

5. Profanities

You may not use profanity or bypass the software-based censor. In addition to words included in the censor list, sexual remarks may be considered profane when used in certain contexts.

Note: To clarify what is considered to be bypassing the software-based censor: Anything done to avoid the default *'s provided by the censor is considered to be a bypass of the censor. For example, if the word "angle" was in the censor (it isn't), then all of the following are considered a bypass of the censor and thus in violation of this code:

A****
ang1e, angl3
anglë, añgle
a n g l e
Angle
a<!-- a -->ngle

The list of words automatically censored by our filter is available upon request.

6. Harassment

We do not tolerate personal attacks whether public or private on anybody (the definition of a personal attack will be determined on a case by case basis by forum moderators in consultation with the administrator).

You may not use terms or audio/visual materials referring to ethnic/national origin, ideological/religious beliefs, gender, or sexual preference in a demeaning context.

7. Pornography/Sexually Offensive Materials

You may not post or link to pornography or what would normally be considered sexually offensive materials.

8. Illegal Use

You may not use our forums for illegal purposes, or in support of illegal activities, as determined by the laws of Australia in the Australian Capital Territory. Such activities will guarantee an immediate ban. We reserve the right to cooperate with legal authorities and/or injured third parties in the investigation of any suspected crime or civil wrongdoing.

9. Non-Disclosure Agreements

We will delete posts containing materials in breach of an active Non-Disclosure Agreement. We reserve the right to cooperate with any company who are conducting an investigation into a breach of a current and enforceable NDA.

10. Privacy

* You may not post any form of real life information of any user (except yourself) unless the user has first given permission by express written consent to the forum administrator. Examples of real life information include name, address, and phone numbers.
* You may not distribute any form of electronic information, email address, private/email Messages, IP addresses, and Instant Messenger messages ("Chatlogs") with intent to harass or be demeaning in any way as determined by a forum management, regardless of consent.
* You may not disclose a user's unpublicised email address unless the user has first given permission by express written consent to the forum administrator or has previously releasing said information themselves.
* You may not at any time post any form of real life information if you are 13 years old or under!
* You may not at any time use private messaging or email for unsolicited contact with community members for the purpose of advertising or selling goods or services!

11. Signatures

Signatures, whether facilitated by the forum software or by the user, may not exceed the following restrictions:

* The maximum font size allowed in signature lines is 2.
* The maximum number of lines in a signature is 2 - (unless used to display MCE hardware specs).
* No images allowed in signatures (* see hyperlinks below).
* Signature text should comply with our regular posting rules. No all-caps, no alternating caps, etc.
* Signature text or content that is too long, obtrusive or serves no purpose will be removed. This includes overly creative use of punctuation, color, font size etc.
* Signatures with just your username will be removed since usernames are on the top of every post.
* Signatures must also follow the same content rules that we have for posting. This means they must not contain include: profanity, pornography, racism, baiting and/or flaming.

Hyperlinks in signatures are allowed but must comply with the following:

* Links (and associated images) are permitted to Xbox Live profiles, server uptime & project stats (e.g. SETI)
* Links to external commercial sites are not permitted for any reason.
* Linked sites may only be personal pages or blogs.
* Links to other forums or sites considered to be in competition with this website (thereby reducing our ability to attract advertising revenue) are not permitted.
* No affiliate links are permitted.

If your signature contravenes any of these rules, it will be removed without notice. For any questions or feedback about specific signature content not covered here, please PM a Staff Member.

12. Official Language

English is the official language of our forums because it is the common language between our moderators and users. Because we cannot moderate conversations in a foreign language, you may not hold a conversation in the forums in language other than English. Foreign languages are allowed in forum signatures as long as:

a.) it is not in violation of this Code of Conduct,
b.) not in a different character set, i.e. áíúúíá éáéä, and
c.) a correct translation of the signature be provided upon request.

13. Email Addresses

* You may not harvest email addresses from our forums for any purpose.
* You are required to keep your forum account's email address up-to-date. If a warning sent to the email address on record bounces, your account will be suspended and you will have to contact forum administration to have your account restored

14. Moderation & Bans

* You may not evade a ban. Doing so will drastically lengthen your ban. If you have a problem with a ban or feel it was inappropriate, please contact an administrator and wait for a response.
* You may not publicly complain about or demand a reason for another user's ban, the deletion of a message, or the deletion/closure of a thread. Any discussion about warnings, bans, message deletion, thread deletion and thread closure should be done over private email/message between the person concerned and the moderators.
* You may not re-edit a message that has been edited by a moderator

15. Miscellaneous

* Do not post negative posts and discussions that are repeated over and over and over with no other purpose than to disrupt conversation. If you feel the need to say something, say it once and then move on. Do not disrupt multiple threads in order to get your view out.
* You may not bait or harass other users. Baiting & harassment is defined as posting with a clear intent to belittle, provoke anger or cause irritation resulting in another user violating this code. Within the same context, you may not bait, insult, flame, harass, provoke or otherwise abuse a staff member.
* You may not abuse your ability to post in HTML in HTML-enabled forums.
* You may not post graphically-disturbing images as inline images (such that the images are displayed when users view your post). You may not link to images which are graphically disturbing.
* You may not post in a manner that is harmful to the MCEBuddy Community or any of its members. If you do, the post will be deleted and you will be permanently banned.
* You may not register multiple accounts for any reason and specifically with the intent to violate any part of this Code of conduct.

Other Questionable Actions and Content

This Code of Conduct cannot cover every circumstance. We reserve the right to act appropriately if a user's actions, including the content of a user's posts, are deemed counterproductive to the peaceful enjoyment or security of our forum community.

A Note About Your Privacy

We respect your privacy and we undertake to safeguard the privacy of your personal data. We realise that the growth of the Internet and online services raises questions concerning the nature, use and confidentiality of information collected about consumers.  MCEBuddy assures you of our commitment to safeguarding your privacy during your Internet activities on this site.