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The Rules of Pacers Digest

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Whether your are a long standing forum member or whether you have just registered today, it's a good idea to read and review the rules below so that you have a very good idea of what to expect when you come to Pacers Digest.

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Why do we do this? So that it's more difficult for spammers (be they human or robot) to post, and so users who are banned cannot immediately re-register and start dousing people with verbal flames.

Below are the rules of Pacers Digest. After you have read them, you will have a very good sense of where we are coming from, what we expect, what we don't want to see, and how we react to things.

Rule #1

Pacers Digest is intended to be a place to discuss basketball without having to deal with the kinds of behaviors or attitudes that distract people from sticking with the discussion of the topics at hand. These unwanted distractions can come in many forms, and admittedly it can sometimes be tricky to pin down each and every kind that can rear its ugly head, but we feel that the following examples and explanations cover at least a good portion of that ground and should at least give people a pretty good idea of the kinds of things we actively discourage:

"Anyone who __________ is a liar / a fool / an idiot / a blind homer / has their head buried in the sand / a blind hater / doesn't know basketball / doesn't watch the games"

"People with intelligence will agree with me when I say that __________"

"Only stupid people think / believe / do ___________"

"I can't wait to hear something from PosterX when he/she sees that **insert a given incident or current event that will have probably upset or disappointed PosterX here**"

"He/she is just delusional"

"This thread is stupid / worthless / embarrassing"

"I'm going to take a moment to point and / laugh at PosterX / GroupOfPeopleY who thought / believed *insert though/belief here*"

"Remember when PosterX said OldCommentY that no longer looks good? "

In general, if a comment goes from purely on topic to something 'ad hominem' (personal jabs, personal shots, attacks, flames, however you want to call it, towards a person, or a group of people, or a given city/state/country of people), those are most likely going to be found intolerable.

We also dissuade passive aggressive behavior. This can be various things, but common examples include statements that are basically meant to imply someone is either stupid or otherwise incapable of holding a rational conversation. This can include (but is not limited to) laughing at someone's conclusions rather than offering an honest rebuttal, asking people what game they were watching, or another common problem is Poster X will say "that player isn't that bad" and then Poster Y will say something akin to "LOL you think that player is good". We're not going to tolerate those kinds of comments out of respect for the community at large and for the sake of trying to just have an honest conversation.

Now, does the above cover absolutely every single kind of distraction that is unwanted? Probably not, but you should by now have a good idea of the general types of things we will be discouraging. The above examples are meant to give you a good feel for / idea of what we're looking for. If something new or different than the above happens to come along and results in the same problem (that being, any other attitude or behavior that ultimately distracts from actually just discussing the topic at hand, or that is otherwise disrespectful to other posters), we can and we will take action to curb this as well, so please don't take this to mean that if you managed to technically avoid saying something exactly like one of the above examples that you are then somehow off the hook.

That all having been said, our goal is to do so in a generally kind and respectful way, and that doesn't mean the moment we see something we don't like that somebody is going to be suspended or banned, either. It just means that at the very least we will probably say something about it, quite possibly snipping out the distracting parts of the post in question while leaving alone the parts that are actually just discussing the topics, and in the event of a repeating or excessive problem, then we will start issuing infractions to try to further discourage further repeat problems, and if it just never seems to improve, then finally suspensions or bans will come into play. We would prefer it never went that far, and most of the time for most of our posters, it won't ever have to.

A slip up every once and a while is pretty normal, but, again, when it becomes repetitive or excessive, something will be done. Something occasional is probably going to be let go (within reason), but when it starts to become habitual or otherwise a pattern, odds are very good that we will step in.

There's always a small minority that like to push people's buttons and/or test their own boundaries with regards to the administrators, and in the case of someone acting like that, please be aware that this is not a court of law, but a private website run by people who are simply trying to do the right thing as they see it. If we feel that you are a special case that needs to be dealt with in an exceptional way because your behavior isn't explicitly mirroring one of our above examples of what we generally discourage, we can and we will take atypical action to prevent this from continuing if you are not cooperative with us.

Also please be aware that you will not be given a pass simply by claiming that you were 'only joking,' because quite honestly, when someone really is just joking, for one thing most people tend to pick up on the joke, including the person or group that is the target of the joke, and for another thing, in the event where an honest joke gets taken seriously and it upsets or angers someone, the person who is truly 'only joking' will quite commonly go out of his / her way to apologize and will try to mend fences. People who are dishonest about their statements being 'jokes' do not do so, and in turn that becomes a clear sign of what is really going on. It's nothing new.

In any case, quite frankly, the overall quality and health of the entire forum's community is more important than any one troublesome user will ever be, regardless of exactly how a problem is exhibiting itself, and if it comes down to us having to make a choice between you versus the greater health and happiness of the entire community, the community of this forum will win every time.

Lastly, there are also some posters, who are generally great contributors and do not otherwise cause any problems, who sometimes feel it's their place to provoke or to otherwise 'mess with' that small minority of people described in the last paragraph, and while we possibly might understand why you might feel you WANT to do something like that, the truth is we can't actually tolerate that kind of behavior from you any more than we can tolerate the behavior from them. So if we feel that you are trying to provoke those other posters into doing or saying something that will get themselves into trouble, then we will start to view you as a problem as well, because of the same reason as before: The overall health of the forum comes first, and trying to stir the pot with someone like that doesn't help, it just makes it worse. Some will simply disagree with this philosophy, but if so, then so be it because ultimately we have to do what we think is best so long as it's up to us.

If you see a problem that we haven't addressed, the best and most appropriate course for a forum member to take here is to look over to the left of the post in question. See underneath that poster's name, avatar, and other info, down where there's a little triangle with an exclamation point (!) in it? Click that. That allows you to report the post to the admins so we can definitely notice it and give it a look to see what we feel we should do about it. Beyond that, obviously it's human nature sometimes to want to speak up to the poster in question who has bothered you, but we would ask that you try to refrain from doing so because quite often what happens is two or more posters all start going back and forth about the original offending post, and suddenly the entire thread is off topic or otherwise derailed. So while the urge to police it yourself is understandable, it's best to just report it to us and let us handle it. Thank you!

All of the above is going to be subject to a case by case basis, but generally and broadly speaking, this should give everyone a pretty good idea of how things will typically / most often be handled.

Rule #2

If the actions of an administrator inspire you to make a comment, criticism, or express a concern about it, there is a wrong place and a couple of right places to do so.

The wrong place is to do so in the original thread in which the administrator took action. For example, if a post gets an infraction, or a post gets deleted, or a comment within a larger post gets clipped out, in a thread discussing Paul George, the wrong thing to do is to distract from the discussion of Paul George by adding your off topic thoughts on what the administrator did.

The right places to do so are:

A) Start a thread about the specific incident you want to talk about on the Feedback board. This way you are able to express yourself in an area that doesn't throw another thread off topic, and this way others can add their two cents as well if they wish, and additionally if there's something that needs to be said by the administrators, that is where they will respond to it.

B) Send a private message to the administrators, and they can respond to you that way.

If this is done the wrong way, those comments will be deleted, and if it's a repeating problem then it may also receive an infraction as well.

Rule #3

If a poster is bothering you, and an administrator has not or will not deal with that poster to the extent that you would prefer, you have a powerful tool at your disposal, one that has recently been upgraded and is now better than ever: The ability to ignore a user.

When you ignore a user, you will unfortunately still see some hints of their existence (nothing we can do about that), however, it does the following key things:

A) Any post they make will be completely invisible as you scroll through a thread.

B) The new addition to this feature: If someone QUOTES a user you are ignoring, you do not have to read who it was, or what that poster said, unless you go out of your way to click on a link to find out who it is and what they said.

To utilize this feature, from any page on Pacers Digest, scroll to the top of the page, look to the top right where it says 'Settings' and click that. From the settings page, look to the left side of the page where it says 'My Settings', and look down from there until you see 'Edit Ignore List' and click that. From here, it will say 'Add a Member to Your List...' Beneath that, click in the text box to the right of 'User Name', type in or copy & paste the username of the poster you are ignoring, and once their name is in the box, look over to the far right and click the 'Okay' button. All done!

Rule #4

Regarding infractions, currently they carry a value of one point each, and that point will expire in 31 days. If at any point a poster is carrying three points at the same time, that poster will be suspended until the oldest of the three points expires.

Rule #5

When you share or paste content or articles from another website, you must include the URL/link back to where you found it, who wrote it, and what website it's from. Said content will be removed if this doesn't happen.

An example:

If I copy and paste an article from the Indianapolis Star website, I would post something like this:

http://www.linktothearticlegoeshere.com/article
Title of the Article
Author's Name
Indianapolis Star

Rule #6

We cannot tolerate illegal videos on Pacers Digest. This means do not share any links to them, do not mention any websites that host them or link to them, do not describe how to find them in any way, and do not ask about them. Posts doing anything of the sort will be removed, the offenders will be contacted privately, and if the problem becomes habitual, you will be suspended, and if it still persists, you will probably be banned.

The legal means of watching or listening to NBA games are NBA League Pass Broadband (for US, or for International; both cost money) and NBA Audio League Pass (which is free). Look for them on NBA.com.

Rule #7

Provocative statements in a signature, or as an avatar, or as the 'tagline' beneath a poster's username (where it says 'Member' or 'Administrator' by default, if it is not altered) are an unwanted distraction that will more than likely be removed on sight. There can be shades of gray to this, but in general this could be something political or religious that is likely going to provoke or upset people, or otherwise something that is mean-spirited at the expense of a poster, a group of people, or a population.

It may or may not go without saying, but this goes for threads and posts as well, particularly when it's not made on the off-topic board (Market Square).

We do make exceptions if we feel the content is both innocuous and unlikely to cause social problems on the forum (such as wishing someone a Merry Christmas or a Happy Easter), and we also also make exceptions if such topics come up with regards to a sports figure (such as the Lance Stephenson situation bringing up discussions of domestic abuse and the law, or when Jason Collins came out as gay and how that lead to some discussion about gay rights).

However, once the discussion seems to be more/mostly about the political issues instead of the sports figure or his specific situation, the thread is usually closed.

Rule #8

We prefer self-restraint and/or modesty when making jokes or off topic comments in a sports discussion thread. They can be fun, but sometimes they derail or distract from a topic, and we don't want to see that happen. If we feel it is a problem, we will either delete or move those posts from the thread.

Rule #9

Generally speaking, we try to be a "PG-13" rated board, and we don't want to see sexual content or similarly suggestive content. Vulgarity is a more muddled issue, though again we prefer things to lean more towards "PG-13" than "R". If we feel things have gone too far, we will step in.

Rule #10

We like small signatures, not big signatures. The bigger the signature, the more likely it is an annoying or distracting signature.

Rule #11

Do not advertise anything without talking about it with the administrators first. This includes advertising with your signature, with your avatar, through private messaging, and/or by making a thread or post.
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The deprication of sports memories [Bill Simmons]

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  • #1

    The deprication of sports memories [Bill Simmons]

    I thought this was pretty good:

    http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2...5&sportCat=nba

    The depreciation of sports memories

    By Bill Simmons
    Page 2
    Editor's note: This column appears in the June 11 issue of ESPN The Magazine.

    When NBA TV replayed John Havlicek's final game last April, the only people watching were probably me and the Havliceks. I found myself riveted for three reasons. First, the opening tip-off was delayed for over eight minutes because Celtics fans wouldn't stop cheering after Hondo was introduced. Second, after Buffalo's Randy Smith was ejected, I could see my tiny self sitting on my father's lap as Smith walked through the tunnel. And third, according to CBS's ancient-looking halftime graphics, Havlicek's statistical résumé on April 9, 1978 looked like this:


    Most games played (1,269). Most playoff games played (172). Only player to score 1,000 points in 16 straight seasons. Third, career scoring (26,895 points). Second, career minutes played (46,407).


    Seeing those numbers 29 years later, my gast was flabbered. Yeah, I grew up in Boston and vividly remember Hondo carrying us to the 1976 title on a bad wheel. I knew he was one of the best players of his time, a physical freak of nature, someone who routinely played 42 to 44 minutes a night without ever stopping or seeming tired. Throughout his final season, I remember opposing teams showering him with gifts at every stop. But third in scoring, second in minutes and first in games played? John Havlicek?
    I did some digging after the game and found that Hondo made 13 straight All-Star teams, four All-NBA first teams and seven second teams; he played for eight title teams and won the 1974 Finals MVP, and he earned one of 11 spots on the NBA's 35th-anniversary team, in 1980. To this day, he ranks 10th in points, eighth in minutes and seventh in playoff points. By any measure, he remains one of the 20 best players ever. But if you asked 100 diehard NBA fans under 30 to name their top 20, how many would name Havlicek? Three? Five?


    Which begs the question: Does greatness have a shelf life?
    This issue gained steam for me after LeBron's "48 Special"last week.
    Clearly, something monumental had happened: Not only did Marv Albert bless the performance as one of the greatest in playoff history, but it felt like a tipping point for LeBron's career, the night he fully tapped into his considerable gifts and lifted to another level. When talking heads, columnists, bloggers and fans raced to put the night into perspective, for once all the hyperbole seemed justified. More than a few people played the "MJ was great, but he never had a game like that!" card, as if Jordan's remarkable career needed to be demeaned for everyone to fully respect what LeBron had accomplished. I even wrote online that Jordan never physically overpowered an opponent the way LeBron ramshackled the Pistons and compared him to Bo Jackson and the way he wreaked havoc in his prime.


    By Saturday, after everyone had calmed down, I found myself recalling some of Jordan's killer moments -- how he coldly destroyed Clyde Drexler in the 1992 Finals, how he prevailed against the rugby tactics of Pat Riley's Knicks, how he stole Game 7 against the 1998 Pacers by repeatedly getting to the line (like a running back moving the chains), how he ended his Chicago career with the incredible layup-steal-jumper sequence in Utah -- and regretting that, like nearly everyone else, I had fallen into the "Let's degrade the old guy to coronate the new guy!" trap.


    That's something I've always sworn I would never do. One of my favorite books is Wait Till Next Year, in which a sports columnist (Mike Lupica) and a Hollywood screenwriter (William Goldman) trade chapters about a particularly crazy year in New York sports. Writing as a fan, Goldman submits an impassioned defense of Wilt Chamberlain's legacy, called "To the Death," which is one of my favorite pieces. He argues that great athletes fade from memory not because they're surpassed by better ones but because either we forget about them or our memories are tainted by things that have nothing to do with their career (like Bill Russell's being a lousy announcer, or OJ's being an, um, lousy ex-husband). Goldman writes, "the greatest struggle an athlete undergoes is the battle for our memories. It's gradual. It begins before you're aware that it's begun, and it ends with a terrible fall from grace. It really is a battle to the death." This piece was published in 1988, when Bird and Magic were at the height of their powers and Jordan was nearing the same tipping point LeBron reached in Detroit. Already saddened that we'd be poking holes in them some day, Goldman predicted, "Bird and Magic's time is coming. It's easy being fans of theirs now. Just wait. Give it a decade." Then he wrote an entire mock paragraph of fans picking apart their games in the year 2000, complaining that Magic couldn't guard anyone and Bird was too slow. He ended with this mock quote: "Sure (Bird) was good, and so was Magic9but they couldn't play today." I remember reading that piece in college and thinking, Come on, that's ludicrous. Nobody will ever forget Bird and Magic! Those guys saved the NBA!


    Well, you know what? It's 2007, and no one gives a crap about Bird and Magic anymore. Goldman was right. The phenomenon was in full swing after 48 Special -- again, a magnificent event, but one that paled in comparison with a 20-year-old Magic jumping center in Philly, slapping up a 42/15/7, playing five positions and leading the Lakers to the 1980 title. Imagine if something like that happened today? There would be pieces of Skip Bayless' head scattered across the entire city of Bristol.


    So why do we pump up the present at the expense of the past? Goldman believed that every era is "so arrogant (and) so dismissive," and again he was right, although that arrogance/dismissiveness isn't entirely intentional. We'd like to believe that our current stars are better than the guys we once watched.


    Why? Because the single best thing about sports is the unknown. It's much more fun to think about what could happen than about what already has. We don't want LeBron to be as good as MJ; we need him to be better than MJ. We already did the MJ thing. Who wants to rent the same movie twice? We want LeBron to take us to a place we've never been. It's the same reason we convince ourselves that Shaq is better than Wilt and Steve Nash is better than Bob Cousy. We don't know these things for sure. We just want them to be true.


    There's a much simpler reason that we're incapable of fully appreciating the past. As the Havlicek broadcast proved to me, it's easy to forget anything if you stop thinking about it long enough, even something as ingrained as "My favorite basketball team employed one of the best 20 players ever when I was a little kid." Once upon a time, the Boston Garden fans cheered Hondo for 510 seconds. And I was there, in the building.
    But that's the funny thing about noise: Eventually, it stops.
    Tags: None
  • #2
    Re: The deprication of sports memories [Bill Simmons]

    Pretty good stuff.

    And I think his concept (or Goldman's concept, really) is accelerating in the Internet/24-hour sports news world. There's so much talk about the now (see: this board/ESPN News/Around the Horn/Sports Talk Radio all day long, etc.) that the past becomes even further and further away more quickly.

    For more proof, see the other thread where some people think we were better than Shaq's Lakers. C'mon....Remember Shaq that year? The guy was an 1,000-ton asteroid that was completely unstoppable. We had NOOOO chance there. None. Zero. Cero.

    And if you think we did, it's just because you're depreciating how dominant the Big Fella was during his 3-4 year apex.
    Read my Pacers blog:
    8points9seconds.com

    Follow my twitter:
    @8pts9secs

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    • #3
      Re: The deprication of sports memories [Bill Simmons]

      Actually that was pretty good - even though I hate the guy. But LeBron took the first step of many, many he will need to take to even come close. In fact, there are many still ahead of him.

      If the Cavs don't take the title, the performance of the runner-up in a conference final will fade just as quickly.
      The best exercise of the human heart is reaching down and picking someone else up.

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      • #4
        Re: The deprication of sports memories [Bill Simmons]

        I've always thought the guy wrote good columns. To a Colts fan, yes he can be irritating. But I realize he is a homer. All sports fans are at some level, whether they want to admit it or not.

        Comment

        • #5
          Re: The deprication of sports memories [Bill Simmons]

          Goldman submits an impassioned defense of Wilt Chamberlain's legacy, called "To the Death,"
          Little known trivial: The original title of that part was "To the Pain".


          /not really
          You're caught up in the Internet / you think it's such a great asset / but you're wrong, wrong, wrong
          All that fiber optic gear / still cannot take away the fear / like an island song

          - Jimmy Buffett

          Comment

          • #6
            Re: The deprication of sports memories [Bill Simmons]

            Originally posted by Doug View Post
            Little known trivial: The original title of that part was "To the Pain".


            /not really
            Is this a kissing book?
            PSN: MRat731 XBL: MRat0731

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            • #7
              Re: The deprication of sports memories [Bill Simmons]

              Originally posted by MagicRat View Post
              Is this a kissing book?
              Nah...Wilt's book on women was called "To the Curb"
              Read my Pacers blog:
              8points9seconds.com

              Follow my twitter:
              @8pts9secs

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              • #8
                Re: The deprication of sports memories [Bill Simmons]

                Wilt is still the greatest player ever. But everyone under the age of 30 looks at me cross-eyed when I say that.
                Why do the things that we treasure most, slip away in time
                Till to the music we grow deaf, to God's beauty blind
                Why do the things that connect us slowly pull us apart?
                Till we fall away in our own darkness, a stranger to our own hearts
                And life itself, rushing over me
                Life itself, the wind in black elms,
                Life itself in your heart and in your eyes, I can't make it without you

                Comment

                • #9
                  Re: The deprication of sports memories [Bill Simmons]

                  Originally posted by Jay View Post
                  Wilt is still the greatest player ever. But everyone under the age of 30 looks at me cross-eyed when I say that.
                  Continuing on the Simmons theme of this thread......

                  What about Kurt Thomas? He's 34. How does he look at you?
                  Read my Pacers blog:
                  8points9seconds.com

                  Follow my twitter:
                  @8pts9secs

                  Comment

                  • #10
                    Re: The deprication of sports memories [Bill Simmons]

                    Originally posted by Jay View Post
                    Wilt is still the greatest player ever. But everyone under the age of 30 looks at me cross-eyed when I say that.
                    how could you say that when you lived through the harold miner era?
                    This is the darkest timeline.

                    Comment

                    • #11
                      Re: The deprication of sports memories [Bill Simmons]

                      All David Stern's fault. Seriously.
                      You Got The Tony!!!!!!

                      Comment

                      • #12
                        Re: The deprication of sports memories [Bill Simmons]

                        Originally posted by JayRedd View Post
                        Nah...Wilt's book on women was called "To the Curb"
                        Originally posted by JayRedd View Post
                        What about Kurt Thomas? He's 34. How does he look at you?
                        Two funny posts in one thread deserves a mention.

                        Comment

                        • #13
                          Re: The deprication of sports memories [Bill Simmons]

                          Originally posted by Adam1987 View Post
                          I've always thought the guy wrote good columns. To a Colts fan, yes he can be irritating. But I realize he is a homer. All sports fans are at some level, whether they want to admit it or not.
                          Agreed. I don't always agree with what Simmons writes, but he's an excellent writer (unlike The Badger).

                          Comment

                          • #14
                            Re: The deprication of sports memories [Bill Simmons]

                            Originally posted by JayRedd View Post
                            Continuing on the Simmons theme of this thread......

                            What about Kurt Thomas? He's 34. How does he look at you?

                            Hilarious! That had me in tears!

                            Comment

                            • #15
                              Re: The deprication of sports memories [Bill Simmons]

                              Originally posted by MagicRat View Post
                              Is this a kissing book?
                              Someday, you may not mind so much.




                              This is probably the first time The Princess Bride tangent is actually "on topic".
                              You're caught up in the Internet / you think it's such a great asset / but you're wrong, wrong, wrong
                              All that fiber optic gear / still cannot take away the fear / like an island song

                              - Jimmy Buffett

                              Comment

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