Discouraged: Where are the guidelines for participating on the forum located?

[JMK1954]

I must admit that not being able to find any forum guidelines / rules put me off posting anything to start with. I'm glad it's not just me that couldn't find them. I definitely think they need to be made more obvious.

 

[Bluetit1802]

I would like to suggest the forum rules (Or Forum Ethos) are at the very top of the forum home page above the heading "Diabetes Discussion"

http://www.diabetes.co.uk/forum/

as a sticky, headed in large bold capital letters with a please read message underneath.

I wonder if this could be discussed in your discussions?

@AndBreathe @Brunneria @Pipp @Jaylee @Juicyj @tim2000s @azure @himtoo @urbanracer @Enclave @andcol

 

[Goonergal]

Perhaps the rules - or a link to them - could be included in the introductory materials sent by @daisy1 ?

 

[Squire Fulwood]

Perhaps the rules - or a link to them - could be included in the introductory materials sent by @daisy1 ?

I agree but why doesn't the site deal with the problem itself.

 

[Winnie53]

I am in the process of responding to a request for more information from the moderators. I want to be clear, my issue is with the administration of the forum, not with the moderators. I greatly appreciate the very important work they do here, as do many of you. I looked at a lot of diabetes forums before and after I came here. I love this forum.

Thank you for sharing your frustrations, experiences and suggestions. It helps.

 

[Totto]

I love this forum. I enjoy helping people. But recently more than one of my posts have been edited. This has happened a total of three or four times during my two years here. But now I wonder if it's happening all the time because I'm usually not informed.

Is it true you have had posts edited with no explanation why? That is odd, as in the forum rules, as far as I remember, at least a brief note is required of the moderator moderating as to why a post has been moderated, stating in what way the post broke the forum rules.

 

[Winnie53]

Is it true you have had posts edited with no explanation why?

An alert and brief explanation was provided in the first occurrence but not the second. Both posts had some content and links removed. The moderators did not self identify, so I had no recourse.

In the second occurrence there was no tag under my post stating that a moderator had edited it, so forum members reading it would have had no way of knowing that a moderator edited my post.

I have completed and submitted my response to the moderators. Not happy at the moment, but I am grateful for the moderator's request for more information.

 

[andcol]

Winnie/All

The moderation team act as a team We will not identify the single individual who carried out an action. This has been discussed before.

Please be aware that the moderation team discuss reports etc in great detail unless something appears to be hugely contrary to the rules that have been linked to above, ie, dangerous information, overly worrying/overwhelming a new person. Note that the poster should be told. The action will still then be discussed. We have the capability to review all versions of posts and revert them if required.

If we have to clean up a thread/large portions of a thread (occasionally they can become argumentative as you know) we will not necessarily send a notification on every post but should inform the members that the thread has been moderated. This is sometimes as a post in the thread or PM

Unfortunately things can go wrong occasionally/accidentally... I have a couple of times merged threads etc unintentionally and then had to unpick things when it is discovered

Hopefully this post shows you a little of the inner workings of the mod team and that changes are not just made for know reason.

A

 

[Winnie53]

@andcol I think most, if not all, who have posted here appreciate and value the important role you and the other moderators fulfill on the forum. It's the way the forum is administered that's being discussed, not the moderators. Not sure how else to say it. Hope that clarifies the intent of this topic...

 

[Administrator]

I love this forum. I enjoy helping people. But recently more than one of my posts have been edited. This has happened a total of three or four times during my two years here. But now I wonder if it's happening all the time because I'm usually not informed.

When I have free time, I come onto the forum and look for questions that I personally would like to learn more about. If I find one, I do online searches and post links to information that I think will be helpful. This process often takes an hour or more. Imagine my disappointment when an hour, sometimes hours, of my contributions, disappear. Poof, gone...

I don't understand what I'm doing wrong. And equally frustrating, I can't find the forum guidelines. Could someone provide a link?

Not sure what to do. Should I continue posting helpful information where everyone can read it? Or should I just contact the original poster privately to insure they receive the information I compiled for them?

I thought the purpose of participating on a forum was to help one another.

[Edited to add]: What is the purpose of this forum?

Hi Winnie - thanks for raising your concern. You're absolutely right, the forum is about helping one another.

Your posts shouldn't have been edited unless they went against the forum rules. We'll take a look at this on Tuesday and get back to you. Thanks.
@CaptainWard

 

[Winnie53]

Thank you. Much appreciated.

 

[Winnie53]

Message content deleted as it breaches Forum Rule 12.

".... Publicly disclosing content from private messages without the sender's consent. ...."

http://www.diabetes.co.uk/forum/threads/community-ethos-forum-rules.50278/