The Dominion Lunch forums are intended to provide a warm, friendly atmosphere for the community. In order to maintain order and a sense of community, all users should read and follow these conditions. By participating in the forum, users are affirming their willingness to comply with these terms. This memorandum has been created to provide you with information about what you can expect here, what is expected of you, and to answer some questions you may have in your use of the Dominion Lunch forums.

RULES OF CONDUCT

1. Be respectful of others at all times.
The purpose of the forum is to provide a sense of community and offer a platform for the exchange of ideas. Occasionally, there will be conflicts that arise when people voice opinions. Be courteous when disagreeing with others. It is possible to disagree without being insulting.

2. Ranting is prohibited
A rant is a post which is long-winded, redundant and filled with angry, non-constructive comments. A free exchange of ideas is essential to building a strong sense of community and can be helpful, but rants are disruptive and incite flaming and trolling. Please post your thoughts in a concise, clear manner and avoid going off on rambling tangents.

3. Personal attacks are prohibited.
Commonly known as flaming, personal attacks are posts which are designed to personally berate or insult another. Text of this nature is not beneficial to the community spirit and will not be tolerated.

4. Trolling is prohibited.
Trolling is the word used to describe a post that is deliberately designed for the purpose of angering and insulting the members of the forum community. Posts of this nature are disruptive and do not convey a friendly attitude.

5. No posting of personal information.
Please respect the privacy of other Members and do not give out information such as phone numbers and addresses.

6. Private communication between the Forum members, moderators and administrators of the forum and the forum users is not to be made public on these forums or by any other venue.
You are not permitted to publicize any private correspondence (including petitions) received from any of the aforementioned.

7. Warnings and bans are not to be discussed on the forum.
Such matters shall remain private between the Admin and the user. Questions or comments concerning warnings and bans will be conveyed through e-mail or private messaging. Likewise, discussions regarding moderator actions are not permitted on the forum. If you have questions regarding a post or thread, please contact dominionlunchforum.welcome@yahoo.com" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false.

8. Immediate banning from the forum can result from but are not limited to any of the following:
The posting of pornography; discriminatory remarks which are sexually explicit, harmful, threatening, abusive, defamatory, obscene, hateful, racially or ethnically offensive; excessive obscene or vulgar language; posts which violate Rules of Conduct; posts which discuss or illustrate illegal activity; providing links to sites that contain any of the aforementioned.

9. Spamming, bumping and pyramid quoting are prohibited.
Spam is considered to be repetitive posting of the same topic or text or nonsensical posts that have no substance and are often designed to annoy other forum users. Bumping posts in order to keep them near the top of the list is also prohibited. Petitions or "/signed" posts are a version of bumping and likewise are not permitted. Pyramid quoting is a response to a forum thread that contains the quotes of four or more previous posters, sometimes with additional spaces added unnecessarily. Posts of this nature are not conducive to community spirit and are unwelcome.

10. Redundant threads will be deleted.
As a courtesy to others before beginning a new thread, please look to see if an active thread on that topic has already been established. If so, place your comments there instead. Multiple threads on the same subject clutter up the forum needlessly and many good ideas may be lost. Keep discussions about one topic to one thread only.

11. Post constructively.
Negative feedback can be very useful, provided that it is presented in a civil, factual manner. Tell us what you don't like and why and how you feel it could be improved. Posts that are insulting and rude may be deleted, no matter how valid the ideas behind them may be. Additionally, restating your position over and over are not conducive to the community spirit.

12. Disputes which cannot be resolved between forum users and moderators may be arbitrated by the forum administrators.
To discuss problems or concerns, please send an e-mail to: dominionlunchforum.welcome@yahoo.com" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false.

13. Please use English when posting on the forums.
Please use English when posting on the forums as a courtesy to other posters. If you need to use another language, please include a complete English translation in your post.

14. Do not post pornographic images, fetish pictures, or disturbing medical photos
Because this site is not designed strictly for adults, there are a lot of people here to whom it is illegal to show that stuff. If something is borderline, link to it with a warning as to the content, or PM a mod before posting.

Additionally, if you're about to post something that could cause trouble for users browsing while at school or work, add a "NSFW" (Not Safe For Work) tag to the subject line. Sometimes a NSFW image will come up in the context of the conversation and be appropriate to link to with the label NSFW. Just make sure it doesn't fall into any of the above categories.

15. Use thumbnails
Don't embed full-sized pictures directly into your post. Instead, use an image host that provides thumbnails for you to link to. This will greatly improve the performance of the forum and not break the horizontal-scroll.

Anything wider than 500 pixels must be thumbnailed or it will be removed by a moderator. If you need help thumbnailing an image, just ask and a moderator will be happy to teach you.

16. Do Not Hotlink
Linking to images hosted on someone else’s website is not allowed, unless the server that is hosting the image is your own. Instead, save the image to your computer and re-host it on an image hosting site. If you don't know how to use an image hosting site, just ask and a moderator will be happy to teach you. Also, please make sure to preview your post to make sure the codes were pasted in correctly.

17. Do not spam
Certain links, such as personal websites or forums, may be displayed in signatures (no links to nudity, retail sites, or auction sites), but cannot be placed in an actual post. All such links will be removed by a moderator.

18. Do not have huge avatars
Avatars should not be greater than 120x120 pixels. If your avatar is too large, it will be removed by an admin and replaced with something embarrassing. Once you find a suitable avatar, feel free to change it in your Profile at any time. Additionally, avatars and signatures need to be completely safe for work. They appear in every post you make, which equates to populating the whole board, and must be safe for general browsing.

Do not send offensive images through PMs without permission from the recipient. If you do so, you will have that ability removed.

19. Explicit Language
Profanity is allowed, but personal attacks based on race, religion or sexual orientation are prohibited, as are explicit descriptions of sexual acts or acts of excessive violence towards any person (member or non-member alike.)

20. Exceptions:
While these rules cover most common situations, they cannot anticipate everything. Consequently we reserve the right to take any actions we deem appropriate to ensure these forums are not disrupted or abused in any way.

Your Admins here are Dominion, Tessa, and ILovePapaSmurf. If you have any concerns over anything related to the board, please contact one of these members.