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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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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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I forsee things happening at the deadline.....

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  • I forsee things happening at the deadline.....

    This has been flirted with on other threads, but I didn't see a thread for it.

    With the way this TEAM has played lately, and I say team because it's not about the Ron distractions, I truely feel that Donnie and Larry will try and shake things up before the deadline. Not to mention that they have already been talking with other teams.

    The Chemistry is now shot with this team and, as others have said, something has to give.

  • #2
    Re: I forsee things happening at the deadline.....

    Even Mike Wells feels the Pacers will make another trade,

    It would be unpopular with most but I can see Fred Jones being moved for someone like Chris Wilcox. Two players who will be restricted free agents following the season.

    Anthony Johnson , might be moved. Jamaal Tinsley will be hard to move but you never know. But I get a feeling Stephen Jackson is going nowhere. Even a deal involving Austin Croshere would not be a shocker.

    Feb.23rd is still almost 4 weeks away could be very interesting , a lot will be decided in the next few games without Jermaine and with Peja.

    Comment


    • #3
      Re: I forsee things happening at the deadline.....

      I wouldn't be surprised if either AJ/Freddie/Croshere/Foster ( all players supposedly rumored to be included in any previous Artest-rumor for salary-matching reasons but I think also for cap-relief ) would be moved for draft picks, some backup type PF/C player with a 2-3 year contract or a player with an expiring contract. My money is on AJ or Freddie as we are thin up front.

      Tinsley is too hard to move this season....and despite my wishes to move SJax now...I think that the Pacers will keep him simply cuz we will need him to be competitive to make a playoff push without JONeal.
      Ash from Army of Darkness: Good...Bad...I'm the guy with the gun.

      Comment


      • #4
        Re: I forsee things happening at the deadline.....

        We have exactly one expiring big dollar contract.

        Guess who I think will be most likely to leave at the deadline?
        “Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.” - Winston Churchill

        “If you can't be a good example, then you'll just have to serve as a horrible warning.” - Catherine Aird

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        • #5
          Re: I forsee things happening at the deadline.....

          Hard to predict, but personally I before the deadline would only sign a tall and strong player - PF or C - for 10 days. No other changes, unless smth very good and unexpected is offered. This team needs to relax and consolidate now.

          Comment


          • #6
            Re: I forsee things happening at the deadline.....

            Originally posted by Los Angeles
            We have exactly one expiring big dollar contract.

            Guess who I think will be most likely to leave at the deadline?
            If the Pacers intended to replace Pollard's salary with another player's new long-term contract, they would have traded him in an Artest deal.

            If Pollard gets traded for something other than a larger expiring contract I will be shocked. The Pacers probably intend to let his contract expire and gain the luxury tax relief next year.

            Comment


            • #7
              Re: I forsee things happening at the deadline.....

              I would hesitantly accept a Jones-for-Wilcox trade. I don't think Freddie is in our plans, so if DW/LB like Wilcox then it makes sense, particularly with JO down.
              "I'll always be a part of Donnie Walsh."
              -Ron Artest, Denver Post, 12.28.05

              Comment


              • #8
                Re: I forsee things happening at the deadline.....

                Originally posted by SwissExpress
                Hard to predict, but personally I before the deadline would only sign a tall and strong player - PF or C - for 10 days. No other changes, unless smth very good and unexpected is offered. This team needs to relax and consolidate now.
                yup
                Word on the street is he doesn't want your money, he only wants to please your ears...
                Bum in Berlin on Myspace

                Comment


                • #9
                  Re: I forsee things happening at the deadline.....

                  This team is ultimately going to go younger and athletic. I see Freddie, SJax, Saras, Harrison and Granger staying. Everyone else (including JO) are probably being shopped.

                  JO and Tinsley are unbelievable when they are healthy and have their heads in the game. That is too infrequent though. This team needs guys who stay healthy. Foster, Pollard, Croshere, Tinsley, JO, and of course Bender are hurt too often. It hurts the continuity and chemistry of the team. I don't necessarily think it's a matter of conditioning as much as it is a matter of style of play and bad physiology. These guys are injury prone and probably always will be.
                  "The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results."
                  - Benjamin Franklin

                  Comment


                  • #10
                    Re: I forsee things happening at the deadline.....

                    Normally, I would say there's no chance. But since this team is already severely messed up and JO is out for the foreseeable future, there could easily be another deal or two to get done. We need to scrap building around JO/Ron and now build around JO/Peja, and we may as well start the process now. I just hope we don't do any crappy trades.

                    Comment


                    • #11
                      Re: I forsee things happening at the deadline.....

                      Our championship hopes are gone for this year so I think Bird and Walsh will look to retool. If they can make a trade before the trade deadline I believe they will. As for the chances of each player being traded, here's what I think.

                      10% JO- won't be traded unless someone like Bosh is available, and since he/JO is injured it wouldn't be until this summer. I think he needs to have an easy summer so his body can heal and he won't be getting so many injuries.

                      50% Croshere-I don't think the Pacers are looking to move him, but they will if a good deal materializes.

                      0% Bender- they want him to retire.

                      25% Pollard- has an expiring contract so unless a deal is pretty good the Pacers will keep him to lower their own payroll. He's a big, so would probably be resigned to a minimum contract.

                      100% Tinsley-I think he is either gone by the deadline or this summer. He's injury prone, has a questionable attitude at the best of times, and sometimes has his own agenda.

                      100% Jackson- a problem child that can't keep his mouth shut. Probably gone by the deadline.

                      25% Foster- good player, good attitude, perfect backup. Seemingly has learned to shoot free throws. If he could hit the 15 footer too would be dynamite. Not likely to be traded.

                      10% Jasikevicius- not going anywhere.

                      75% Johnson- probably sealed his fate when he was slow to get off the floor and got a tech called on the Pacers for 6 men on the floor.

                      60% Jones- right now the only Pacer that can guard quick guards. Probably will be traded because he's a free agent that will enhance his value to more than the Pacers want to pay with JO out.

                      00% Granger- I suppose there are scenario's where the Pacers would trade him, but very unlikely because he's already a good player, he has loads of potential, plus he's a good citizen.

                      75% Gill-the only reason he would be traded is to make salaries match.

                      25% Harrison-still RAW. has potential because of his size, but something of a flake.

                      --% Peja- pretty much of an unknown at this time.

                      Comment


                      • #12
                        Re: I forsee things happening at the deadline.....

                        I like your percentages, Will, but I wonder are they based solely on basketball factors and not as much on money?

                        For instance, I totally agree that Jax must go, but does his contract make that difficult? Isn't it more likely that TPTB will go head over heart on this matter? I hate it, but that seems likely to me. I will the happiest if it isn't.

                        I disagree on AJ. Methinks your talking with your heart again (I do the same--I'd like to see AJ traded!), but the AJ thing was really an anomaly. He is usually always the good soldier, doing exactly what Rick wants, which is precisely why he gets so many dadgum minutes.
                        "Look, it's up to me to put a team around ... Lance right now." —Kevin Pritchard press conference

                        Comment


                        • #13
                          Re: I forsee things happening at the deadline.....

                          Originally posted by McKeyFan
                          I like your percentages, Will, but I wonder are they based solely on basketball factors and not as much on money?
                          They were based on what I thought the chances of them being traded by the Pacers were. In reality, I think the guys I assigned 80% and above are gone, and the guys below 20% aren't going anywhere. The guys in between, it would depend on the deal.

                          Comment


                          • #14
                            Re: I forsee things happening at the deadline.....

                            This scares me because I think part of the reason were playing bad is because some players were scared they would be moved. To get out of this slump we need everybody to be playing well,and with more trade rumors it will be hard. I know this season is pretty much a bust and I should be thinking about next year and not worrying what is going on now, but I hate to loose.

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