Folks, this is the great "Chiff & Fipple Consolidated Concordat on Policy" thread, hereafter to be known as "CCCP" for short. The Mods have searched and gleaned and tried to pick up on all existing policies, so you should find that everything that currently applies is here, in one place. If there’s anything that you think isn’t here, please contact us by PM (private message).

By posting on the board, you acknowledge that you understand these rules and policies and agree to abide by them.

Here is the following post-by-post content of this thread, for reference:

1 Background and overall policy principles (incorporating "the Pepsi Rule")

2 First time posters

3 Treatment of new and inexperienced posters

4 Politics and religion

5 Lost, stolen and missing instruments

6 Buying and selling

7 Commercial posts

8 Price policing

9 Hotel California

10 Medical advice

11 Copyright

12 Multiple user accounts

13 Use a valid e-mail address

14 Chiff & Fipple on Facebook

15 Principles of Moderation

16 Editing and Deleting Posts

17 Text Enhancements

18 Posting PM or Email Content in Public Threads

1: Background and overall policy principles

These principles have been gleaned from the existing policy announcements governing the board. There is a great deal of detail out there about the origin of these things, if you are keen to go looking.

Principles over rules:

We see the CCCP more as a set of principles than merely one of rules. We expect all members to be guided by the spirit of these principles, to be aware that they are there for good reason, and to exercise Board behavior accordingly. We think this reasonable and makes perfect sense.

Reasonable Person:

The overall guiding principle should be that of being a "Reasonable Person". This idea was originally borrowed by Rich from guidelines used by Carnegie Mellon University:

"Everyone will be reasonable. Everyone expects everyone else to be reasonable. No one is special. Do not be offended if someone suggests you are not being reasonable. Reasonable people think about their use of these facilities, and the needs of others, and adjust their behavior to meet the goals of a common good for the community, i.e., expressing what you want to say, but accepting and accommodating the needs of others."

A Private Party:

The Chiffboard is privately owned. Accordingly, it is akin to a private party, at which most of us are the happy guests. If, in the opinion of the Moderators and Owner of the site, you show yourself to be not conducive to the continuing lighthearted entertainment that is C&F's originally conceived raison d'être, as well as including constructive debate and discussion around here, action may be taken, which, in extreme cases, may include deactivation of your member account.

Obscenity and Crudely Salacious Material/Commentary:

C&F is conceived as a "family site". While a certain amount of adult playfulness is occasionally given a wink so long as it retains enough of a degree of good taste, usually this sort of thing will be subject to moderation - mainly deletion, or editing if we're feeling charitable, or if the word filter does it for us. If you can't resist, find another website. This ain't 4chan.

The Pepsi Rule:

Contrary to what is sometimes thought, criticism of players, instruments, makers, and anything else is allowed. However, please offer such criticism in a constructive way, from your own, personal standpoint, and with such explanations as are necessary. Dale’s illustration, well-used around here, should suffice:

"I do not like Pepsi. It think the bubbles are disagreeable and there is a slightly sharp sensation at the back of one's palate. I prefer the taste of Diet Coke, and this is what I encourage my friends to buy."

vs.

"Pepsi is complete crap, clearly made by drunkards and con men. Anyone who would pay 75 cents for a can of it would have to be a fool. And anyone who would try to sell the crap on ebay is either a thief or is trying to unload a vile elixir that no one in their right mind would want."

First example: OK

Second: Not OK.

The referee’s decision is final.

The Mods always take all possible care in making any decision. Once made, such decisions are not open for debate. Prior to being made, such decisions are not open for debate.

2: First time posters

So as to cut down on spam, the Chiffboard requires Moderator approval of all first-time posts by new Chiffboard users.

When a new user registers, his/her forum posts will not show up immediately, but will enter the moderation queue for one-time evaluation. Once approved, queued posts will appear as usual in the forums, and the user can use the board normally from then on. Bear in mind that evaluation and approval time must to a degree depend on mod availability, which is usually no problem. Nevertheless it's a good idea to allow for at least 24 hours, just in case. Not to beat a dead horse, but the mods have lives, too. Please be patient.

In the case of prospective members-in-good-faith who may have missed or misunderstood some point of C&F policy so that their submissions cannot be approved, a PM offering guidance toward an acceptable new submission will be sent. Otherwise, disapproved posts will be deleted and the user account deactivated.

This precautionary practice has no effect on existing Chiffboard users.

3: Treatment of new and inexperienced posters

The Management are absolutely committed to the Chiff & Fipple forums being welcoming to newcomers. This stands in opposition to the Internet tradition of ignoring or roughing-up newbies. Accordingly, we ask people to be nice to newbies, and to suffer their questions with patience and indulgence. It is perfectly OK to ask newbies to use searches to find answers to common questions, but please remember that newcomers may need to have the search functions called to their attention and may need some help in using them.

4: Politics and religion

We’ve tried. It hasn’t worked here on the Board. Please don’t post on these subjects hereabouts. A hardy group, members of this board (and a scattering of former members), participate in an external forum which is pretty much for Chiff & Fipple folks who want to talk politics and religion. We're grateful for it and are happy to provide a link:

http://cnfpoli.informe.com/

5: Lost and stolen instruments

We have a forum specifically for these. It is the C&F Lost/Stolen/Missing Instruments Forum.

The forum was set up as a place where all Chiffers can see and read these alerts, not just those who tend to frequent only one forum. The more eyes looking out for these instruments, the better. So when you see a new post or thread appear in LSM, please take a moment to check it out.

We'll allow one additional cross-post link in an instrument forum, flutes in Flutes, fiddles in Strings, etc., in keeping with the general desire to keep cross-posting on the Chiffboard to a minimum, and to keep the information centralized in one place.

6: Buying and selling

TEMPORARY POLICY NOTE. THE FOLLOWING SETS OUT THE GENERAL PRINCIPLES WHICH WE WOULD PREFER TO PREVAIL IN RELATION TO THOSE MEMBERS WISHING TO BUY INSTRUMENTS OR SELL THEIR OWN INSTRUMENTS ON THE FORUMS. WE OFFER THE USED INSTRUMENTS EXCHANGE AS A SERVICE PRIMARILY TO MEMBERS WHO ARE ACTIVE CONTRIBUTORS TO THE DISCUSSION FORUMS. HOWEVER, THE MODERATORS HAVE TAKEN THE VIEW THAT IN THE PRESENT UNPRECEDENTED (AND BAD) WORLD ECONOMIC CLIMATE, WE ARE ADOPTING A SOFTER LINE ON A TEMPORARY BASIS. IN PRACTICE, THIS MEANS THAT WE WILL NOT, UNLESS THERE IS CLEAR ABUSE, INSIST ON POSTERS HAVING A PRIOR TRACK RECORD BEFORE POSTING TO SELL THEIR INSTRUMENTS HERE. THIS TEMPORARY POLICY WILL BE REVIEWED FROM TIME TO TIME. WE ENCOURAGE ANYONE WHO DOES POST TO SELL THEIR INSTRUMENTS ON THE BOARD TO ALSO CONSIDER BECOMING A MORE ACTIVE MEMBER OF THE FORUMS.

There is a separate forum for notices about wanting to buy or sell a used instrument called the Used Instrument Exchange (UIE). You may post your item once in the UIE and cross-link it once from one other forum, as appropriate to that instrument. So, for instance, if you’re after a flute, then you may post that fact in the UIE and link from the flute forum; if you’re selling a fiddle, then post in the UIE and link from the Traditional Strings forum etc. Please do not post such items to more than two forums.

Responses to posts in the UIE should be by PM or email only. No replies may be posted on the forum. Posts in the UIE will either be removed after about two weeks, or once the item is sold or withdrawn, whichever is the sooner. Original posters (OPs) are allowed to post additional posts once a week to keep the item ‘active’ in the UIE, when the two week window will run from the latest ‘bump’. OPs should also post to indicate when the item is sold or withdrawn so that the Mods can archive the item.

The owner and moderators of this board cannot get involved in resolving disputes about sales and transactions that occur as a result of members' communications here. We're not responsible for the credibility of buyers or sellers and we are obviously in no position to vouch for them. This applies not only to transactions resulting from the UIE, but also to items bought as a result of Commercial Posts (see below). So, if you buy and sell based on contacts made on this forum, you're on your own!

7: Commercial Posts

Understandably, many of our members object to the use of the Board solely to promote business interests. However, we have in practice allowed some commercial posts, provided they are posted by members who are otherwise contributing to the general discussions on the Board.

The guidelines are as follows:

• You may not use the Board solely to promote your business

• If you are not in the business of making or selling whistles, flutes etc, but simply have a used instrument that you wish to sell, use the UIE and abide by its rules

• If you are in the business of making or selling products related to the content of these forums, AND you have a track record of contributing noncommercial posts to these forums as a member, you may announce the availability of new products, services, & businesses only. Once and only once. You may not include ANY competitive or self-promotional language. We will delete commercial posts in which someone creates an account and then immediately or quickly posts a promotional message without a history of contributing as a genuine member of this on-line community.

• If you are a regularly contributing member of the community (contributing noncommercial posts), you may post a message on the board that describes your business, avoiding competitive language and claims of superior products and services, ONCE A MONTH (not more).

PLEASE POST ALL COMMERCIAL MESSAGES IN ONE FORUM ONLY!

8: Price policing

Criticising posters for the price asked for items, either in the UIE or in commercial posts, is not allowed.

If someone wants to offer to sell a slightly used Generation D for $100, and somebody wants to buy it, that's the business of the seller and the unfortunate buyer (indeed, the internet now allows a motivated person to easily do research to determine that a price is out of bounds). If someone wants to part with a high-end whistle at a price that is higher than the price of a new one, while we would certainly appreciate any irritation on the part of the original maker, we don't think that that is any basis to protest here.

So, we'll be stepping in to moderate posts in which someone is objecting or implying something shady in a FS post. If you suspect something downright crooked is going on, PM a Moderator.

9: Hotel California

"You can check out any time you like, but you can never leave."

On very, very rare occasions, board members decide to leave the board and ask C&F Moderators to delete their accounts and/or purge their posts. We've declined to do that, particularly for a member who has posted extensively. The nature of a thread is a post, responses to the post and quoting of the original post, responses and quotes of responses and so on. If there were technically a way to erase these posts with the push of a button, many threads would be rendered incomprehensible.

It is technically possible to delete an account, although it is rarely done except to spam registrants. When an account is deleted, every post stays on the board, but the name shown of the posting member reverts to "Guest." If a member has posted extensively, this would yield an archive which would include lots of posts by a mysterious "Guest," which we don't think is a good thing. Furthermore, if two or more people who have posted a lot ask for deletion, all of those posts would sort of be fused together as if by this one mysterious "Guest."

There's no agreement on the front end that we'll erase the tracks of a person who decides to leave. And we do not intend to do so.

So, the Hotel California analogy is a little rough. You can check out, you can leave, but we're not going to tear up the paper trail associated with you being in the Hotel.

So. Welcome to the Hotel California.

10: Medical advice

Put simply: don’t.

However, we all like to support one another. So, support is OK, but please do not give what amounts to medical advice on the forums. People may give good advice, or they may give crappy advice, and there is no way for the Moderators to police this. Plus, the forums are not really the place to give or receive such advice, which is normally better dealt with by your doctor. This applies to advice both on mental health issues and more general medical problems.

Here are some examples illustrating what is acceptable support, and what is unacceptable medical advice:

OK: Q: My wrist sometimes hurts when I'm playing my flute. A: Try taking more rest breaks and hold the flute differently.

Not OK: Q; I have clinical depression and I'm not sure if my Prozac helps. A: Stop taking antidepressants and exercise and pray more.

Not OK: Q: My child has ADHD. A: ADHD is a made-up disorder. (Or:) My niece takes Alertease (TM) and is doing much better.

Probably OK: Q: My legs hurt and my eyelids itch and I have a lot of gas. A: Dude. Go see your doctor.

11: Copyright

On occasion we have had to respond to authors whose works have been reproduced without permission on Chiff & Fipple. Happily, so far these cases have worked out well. But, from some light reading on Dale's part regarding fair use, copyrights, and message boards, we understand that there may be some risk to the Board when we copy the text of articles from other publications and paste them on these forums. So, if you find something copyrighted that you want to share with others, do us all a favor and please provide an external link to the piece, rather than cutting and pasting it without attribution and making C&F a legal target.

12: Multiple user accounts

Due to extensive abuse in the past, you are not permitted to post from multiple user accounts - you may only have one account per user. If you wish to change your username, PM a Moderator who will consider your request.

13: Use a valid e-mail address

Because the forum software occasionally needs to send you mail, and in case we need to contact you, you must supply a valid email address in your profile. If you would prefer not to show your email address to other users you can choose not to display it in your profile settings, but you may not put an invalid email address in your profile. (Since the forum software must use that address, this includes addresses made invalid with anti-spam parts that humans can understand.)

14: Chiff & Fipple on Facebook

In case there is a Board outage, and for other announcements when the Board is down, a Chiff & Fipple group has been set up on Facebook.

Here is the link:

http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2229480589