Acceptable Use Policy (AUP) for Forums
on the British-Genealogy.com system
It is important that you read this
The British-Genealogy mailing forums are provided to the public free,
for enjoyment, education and discussion. Each Forum has a specific "topic".
It is the forum administrator's/moderator's responsibility to uphold this
Acceptable Use Policy (AUP). In addition, the forum administrator/moderator
may define his/her own guidelines as applicable, as long as they do not conflict
with this AUP.
You must be aware, as a contributor to a forum that you are to accept this
AUP and to abide by it, and to accept the administrator's enforcement of
it. You may not post messages on the forums that attempt to do the
administrator's/moderator's job, or to impose these or other rules.
Courtesy
Think of a forum as being a discussion between people having common interests
at a meeting in the administrator's own home. You are a guest.
It is accepted that sometimes there may be heated discussions where people
may disagree, but please behave responsibly, and not resort to malicious
statements of a personal nature. The Administrator will not tolerate
maliciousness or personal attacks on others. Under such circumstances, you
may expect to be shown the door. Do not join in with such discussions or
matters relating to them on the forum. If you feel that you really must comment,
then do it by private email. Leave it to the Administrator to handle.
If you receive private emails that are malicious, or that are personal attacks,
contact your ISP and the ISP of the person who sent you the message.
Keep on topic for the forum
Each forum has a defined topic. Overall, the discussions should be about
information and resources relating to these. If the discussion alters its
course into a topic that is covered by a different mailing list, then move
the discussion to the other mailing list or forum. The Administrator reserves
the right to move discussions to other more relevant forums
Discussion of politics, war and religion are to be considered to be "off
topic" and therefore not allowed, except where in direct relevance to your
family history research, or in the forums specifically designated for such
topics.
General chat in a forum is considered to be off-topic, so please conduct
that in private emails, or in the forum provided for that purpose.
Remember that the messages posted to the British-Genealogy forums are stored
in archives for the benefit of people researching their family history, so
that they can access them at a later date.
It is not acceptable to use the forums as a "soap box" to air your views.
Messages about viruses
Virus announcements and discussion of viruses is strictly prohibited except
in the relevant forum specifically for that purpose.
Cross-Posting
Posting of the same message to more than two forums is not allowed.
It is accepted that in your quest for information about a particular ancestor,
that it may be necessary for you to post the same message to, say, the forum
of an adjacent county.
Advertising to do lookups
It is not permitted to advertise on a forum offering to do lookups.
(Either paid for or free). This rule will be strictly enforced by the
Administrator.
For the avoidance of doubt, such messages include those such as "I have this
new book (or fiche or CD) and I am happy to do lookups for anyone". Such
messages undermine the viability of products produced by family history societies
and other organisations.
However, it is allowed and encouraged (subject to the copyright of
the author and licence of the product publisher) to help others on the forums
with their specific family history problems and queries by using or quoting
a limited amount of material from published sources; and in such cases, you
should always refer to the source, its author, the publisher and the product.
Copyright
When posting to the forums, what you write remains your copyright. However,
there are certain considerations that you should bear in mind. You are
responsible for what you write, and you should not infringe the copyright
of others. For the avoidance of doubt, you are allowed to quote short sections
from the works of others. It is the nature of forums that people may quote
all or part of your message in any reply that they may post to the forum,
or in private email messages to others. All messages posted to the
British-Genealogy forums are archived and are accessible to other registered
users of the system. British-Genealogy does not claim copyright of what you
write, but you agree to messages being archived for the future use of other
researchers. Messages cannot be removed from the archives of the forums,
except in the case of directives from a legal court.
Posting of Illegal Copies of Material
British-Genealogy.com has a zero tolerance policy regarding
the posting of illegal copies of material that is either in copyright or
which contravenes the license of use.
This applies to copies of material posted to the forums, or seen to
be being posted in private emails to other users of the system.
In particular, please note that when you have a copy of a census page,
either from a CD or downloaded from a web site, it is ILLEGAL to make a copy
and forward it to someone else. Please read the licence and copyright notice
on the source from where you obtained the census image. It will include the
words "must not be copied" and "for personal research only".
For the avoidance of doubt, this applies to copies
of census page images (which are not allowed), and does not apply
to census transcriptions (which are allowed). A partial image of a census
page, posted as part of a specific query or as an answer to a query
is allowed.
Failure to comply with the rules and responsibilities in this Acceptable
Use Policy may result in a member being suspended or removed from the forum
system, at the discretion of the List Administrator.
Links
Links to commercial sites, including pay per view sites are strictly forbidden and will be removed without warning. Links to other sites merely to boost search engine rankings are also discouraged. This is a genealogy forum not a free advertising medium for all and sundry.
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