Message Board Rules and Guidelines

As well as the standard Terms and Conditions of Use, messages posted to our boards are also subject to the following regulations.

The Message Board Rules are there to ensure that our message boards are a safe and enjoyable place to be. They are used by our moderators to check whether messages are suitable for publication (allowing them to be read by others). The Rules allow us to remove messages which:

• Are likely to cause offense to other people
• May cause legal problems
• Reveal personal details that could endanger personal safety

We encourage lively debate on our message boards and welcome diverse opinions. However, when replying to a posting, please be careful to respond to the ideas stated, rather than name-calling. Posts that attack a person, rather than an idea, will not be published.

We reserve the right to remove any post or user from the Online Borders message boards — although we have no duty to do so. When posts are deleted, it’s usually because they violate one or more of our house rules. Repeated violation of these rules may result in the suspension of your posting privileges.

Specific House Rules:

• Online Borders does not allow obscene, racist or sexually explicit language. Personal attacks are not permitted. We reserve the right to remove posts that are abusive, hateful, or defame or insult anyone. We also reserve the right to remove posts that are off-topic or not in English.
  
  
• It is illegal to harass or threaten anyone. We take threats, harassment and stalking very seriously. Posts that might be construed as such may be deleted and made available to the proper law enforcement officials.
  
  
• No solicitations or advertisements are allowed. This includes advertisements for your business, your own online endeavors or the latest get-rich-quick scheme.
  
  
• You may link to other informational Web sites when relevant to the discussion, but links to commercial sites are generally not allowed. We may make exceptions when the sites in question are pertinent to Online Borders.

• You may not suggest or encourage illegal activity. Online Borders will assist law enforcement officials in any investigation of such activities.

• Choose a username carefully. You may not use names that are offensive, that suggest illegal activities or that are meant to imitate other users. Any such names will be blocked from posting on our message boards.

• You must have copyright ownership of all material that you post on our message boards. No articles, recipes, song lyrics, art or graphics may be posted without the express written consent of the copyright holder. If you’d like to refer to an article from another site, please post no more than a few lines summarizing the article and include a link to it.
  
  
• You must respect the privacy of individuals. This means no posting of phone numbers, addresses, national insurance numbers or any other private information. We discourage users from posting such information even about themselves, as we cannot control how that information may be used beyond our message boards.

• Good manners online means that you don’t post the same note more than once. The online word for posting many times on one topic is “spamming.” We don’t allow it.

• You participate at your own risk on the bulletin boards, in chat rooms and in e-mail. You take responsibility for postings under your username and use the information provided here at your own risk. Online Borders takes no responsibility for the content or opinions posted here.