These are the contribution guidelines which I expect all participants in the InsideAgedCare.com website to abide by. The InsideAgedCare.com website provides an opportunity for readers who wish to discuss or debate issues related to aged care in Australia. This page page covers aspects of community interaction and moderation on the InsideAgedCare.com website, including comments on blogs or articles.
Site information:
InsideAgedCare.com accept no liability in respect of any material submitted by users and published by us, and I am not responsible for its content and accuracy. The views expressed are the personal opinions of the submitter’s. They may not represent the views of InsideAgedCare.com or any other organisation unless specifically stated. InsideAgedCare.com attempts to provide a range of views from the community that can be debated and discussed in a transparent way.
There are several simple guidelines which I expect all participants in the community areas of the InsideAgedCare.com website to abide by, all of which directly inform our approach to community moderation (outlined below). These apply across the site, while moderation decisions are also informed by the context in which comments are made.
Users may submit material for publication under the following terms and conditions:
- Publication of any material you submit will be at our sole discretion. I reserve the right to make additions or deletions to the text or graphics prior to publication, or to refuse publication.
- You warrant that any material you submit is your own original work and that you own the copyright and any other relevant rights. If you would like to inform about material that isn’t your copyright and which I may want to use, please tell me who owns it so I can ask permission to republish.
- I welcome debate and dissent, but personal attacks (on authors, other users or any individual), persistent trolling and mindless abuse will not be tolerated. The key to maintaining the InsideAgedCare.com website as an inviting space is to focus on intelligent discussion of aged care related topics.
- I acknowledge criticism of the articles I publish, but will not allow misrepresentation of the InsideAgedCare.com and my authors to be published on my website. For the sake of robust debate, I will distinguish between constructive, focussed argument and smear tactics.
- You warrant that the material you submit is not obscene, offensive or otherwise illegal, or deliberately intended to upset other users.
- You grant me a non-exclusive, perpetual, irrevocable, royalty-free, worldwide licence to publish and communicate to the public any material you submit to me in any format, including without limitation print and electronic format. You also agree that I may permit other parties to publish and communicate to the public any material you submit to me in any format.
- You will take reasonable steps to ensure that any material you submit is not defamatory of any person. If you suspect that material may be defamatory (or if you are not sure), you must tell me at the time you submit the material.
- I understand that people often feel strongly about issues debated on the site, but will consider removing any content that others might find offensive or threatening. Please respect other people's views and beliefs and consider your impact on others when making your contribution.
- I reserve the right to redirect or curtail conversations, which descend into toxic or threatening views. I don't want to stop people discussing topics they are enthusiastic about, but I do ask users to find ways of sharing their views that do not feel divisive, threatening or toxic to others.
- I will not tolerate racism, sexism, homophobia, contributions that could be interpreted as such or other forms of hate-speech.
- I will remove any content that may put me in legal jeopardy, such as potentially libellous or defamatory postings, or material posted in potential breach of copyright.
- I will remove any posts that are obviously commercial or otherwise spam-like. My aim is that this site should provide a space for people to interact with my content and each other, and I actively discourage commercial entities passing themselves off as individuals, in order to post advertising material or links. This may also apply to people or organisations who frequently post propaganda or external links without adding substantively to the quality of aged care related discussions on the InsideAgedCare.com website.
- Keep it relevant. I know that some conversations can be wide-ranging, but if you post something which is unrelated to the original article or topic ("off-topic") then it may be removed, in order to keep the comments thread on track.
- Be aware that you may be misunderstood, so try to be clear about what you are saying, and expect that people may understand your contribution differently than you intended. Remember that text isn't always a great medium for conversation: tone of voice (sarcasm, humour and so on) doesn't always come across when using words on a screen. You can help to keep the InsideAgedCare.com comments and contributions open to all viewpoints by maintaining a reasonable tone, even in unreasonable circumstances.
- The platform is mine, but the conversation belongs to everybody. I want this to be a welcoming space for intelligent aged care discussions, and I expect participants to help us achieve this by notifying us of potential problems and helping each other to keep conversations inviting and appropriate. If you spot something problematic in community interaction areas, please report it. When I all take responsibility for maintaining an appropriate and constructive environment, the debate itself is improved and everyone benefits.
You acknowledge that any breach of these conditions may cause me damage or loss. You agree to indemnify me in full and permanently against any third-party liabilities, claims, costs, loss or damage I incur as a result of your breach of any conditions outlined above. You must act honestly and in good faith in your dealings with me and (if requested) you must provide me with reasonable assistance to settle, defend or investigate any third party claims arising as a result of publication of material you submit to us.
I reserve the right to remove your access to individual services completely if I believe you are abusing the services in any way.
I ask everyone interacting on the InsideAgedCare.com website to abide by our community standards and participation guidelines. Generally, I want this to continue to be a safe place for stimulating debate and discussion about aged care issues. Contributions which are deliberately offensive, off-topic or otherwise troll-like, are likely to be dealt with in line with these contribution guidelines. Please be careful about deciding to add personal information such as contact details to your comments: remember this is a public and transparent medium of conversation.
All community interaction is subject to some level of moderation, in order to ensure the spirit of the community standards is upheld. In general, I post-moderate community interaction, which keeps the conversation lively.
Moderation approach
Participants who seriously, persistently or ignore the contribution guidelines or terms and conditions will have their posting privileges for all the InsideAgedCare.com community areas withdrawn.
This is not an action that I take lightly. However, I am aiming to create and maintain an online experience consistent with InsideAgedCare.com values, and reserve the right to make decisions, which I feel support that. Please be aware that the author may contact you by email in relation to your participation, especially where an issue comes up in relation to these community standards. Any advice they give/request they make should be adhered to, as our authors enforce these community standards and create a constructive environment for everyone who contributes to the site.
I will, when necessary, remove user postings or comments from our articles, and blog posts.
If a contribution to the InsideAgedCare.com website is perceived as breaching the contribution guidelines set out above, then it will be removed in the interests of keeping community areas of the site appropriate for the vast majority of the people who visit.
(*Note: I will not edit user posts to change the meaning, spelling, or anything else intended by the user. Even if only part of a comment or posting is perceived as breaching the contribution guidelines, the whole thing may be removed. Also, when a comment or post is removed for any of the reasons above, it is sometimes necessary to delete subsequent messages which refer to explicitly or quote from the original (removed) comment, in order to preserve some notion of conversational thread. This may also happen because a later comment quotes directly the problematic bits of the original comment, which just perpetuates the problem. In such cases not every deletion will be marked individually.)
I reserve the right to take steps or implement measures, which I hope will benefit the whole community of the InsideAgedCare.com community participants.
All actions and decisions taken by our moderators are final.
The views expressed in community areas of this site do not necessarily reflect or represent the views of InsideAgedCare.com, its volunteers or contributors. Please remember that by publishing or submitting contributions for the InsideAgedCare.com website you have also agreed to our Terms of use.