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The Rules of Pacers Digest

Hello everyone,

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.

A quick note to new members: Your posts will not immediately show up when you make them. An administrator has to approve at least your first post before the forum software will later upgrade your account to the status of a fully-registered member. This usually happens within a couple of hours or so after your post(s) is/are approved, so you may need to be a little patient at first.

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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Thinking about buying a console (help needed)

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  • Thinking about buying a console (help needed)

    Well, I never thought this day would come but here I am. For Christmas, my wife got me a copy of Dragon Age and I got her a copy of Mass Effect. We sat down to play and realized that in the couple of years since we've gamed our computer had become somewhat underpowered. I realized that for the cost of upgrading our Mac we could do a lot better by getting rid of the desktop entirely, living with a laptop and buying a TV and console.

    We're pretty well locked into a 360 but I'm trying to figure out if that would work for us... The media capabilities look abysmal. As far as I can tell it can't run media off an attached Hard drive and can't access a networked share either. So i'd have to buy a nettop and run Boxee or something.

    Thoughts? Besides play games, what can your xbox do?

    EDIT: To clarify, we currently don't own a TV *OR* a console. But I'm thinking I could get close to $1000 for our iMac... that could get us a 360, a decent 32" TV, and a Revo.
    Last edited by Anthem; 01-01-2010, 09:31 PM.
    This space for rent.

  • #2
    Re: Thinking about buying a console (help needed)

    mass effect and dragon age? if those are the types of games you're going for...PC is where it is at...i've built my system for $700USD over 2 years ago and have no problem playing those games properly...so knowing how technology cheapens computers value, i'm pretty sure you can get my same set-up for half the price these days....

    intel core 2 duo e6700 2.67GHZ *its an old model - not on newegg but the cheapest one there is $120*
    2 GIG DDR2 RAM *$50 on newegg.com*
    GeForce 8600 GTS *found 8600GT for $55 on newegg.com*

    rest is up to you...

    Comment


    • #3
      Re: Thinking about buying a console (help needed)

      If you have a desktop running Windows 7 or Vista Home Premium or Ultimate, the media capabilities are fine. Your desktop can share any media file with the 360 over the network. Mp3, video, pictures. In fact, I have a buddy that basically uses his 360 as his cable box. You can even save whatever media files you have to a flash drive and run them off of that if you don't have network options. What other kind of media options are you looking for?

      Comment


      • #4
        Re: Thinking about buying a console (help needed)

        Originally posted by bellisimo View Post
        mass effect and dragon age? if those are the types of games you're going for...PC is where it is at...i've built my system for $700USD over 2 years ago and have no problem playing those games properly...so knowing how technology cheapens computers value, i'm pretty sure you can get my same set-up for half the price these days....
        Yeah, with the parts I have I figure I could build a pretty great system (quad core, 4gig ram, etc) for $400, plus $150 for a screen. But I can get a 360 for $200.

        Originally posted by travmil View Post
        If you have a desktop running Windows 7 or Vista Home Premium or Ultimate
        Which I don't, or at least wouldn't. The whole point is to ditch the desktop entirely.

        You can even save whatever media files you have to a flash drive and run them off of that if you don't have network options.
        It's a start... does it have to be a flash drive? Could I use an external hard drive?
        This space for rent.

        Comment


        • #5
          Re: Thinking about buying a console (help needed)

          I'm not sure as I've never done the external hard drive. I have personally seen media streaming off of a flash drive plugged into the USB ports on the front of the system.

          Comment


          • #6
            Re: Thinking about buying a console (help needed)

            I am a HUGE fan of the 360 but I'm not sure what all you want in a Entertainment System so I'll just tell you what my girlfriend and I do with ours.

            First and foremost... You need an Xbox, High Speed internet, HD TV and an Xbox LIVE gold account ($50 a year), definitely HD Cables which usually cost extra. To do what I do and have what I have from scratch will cost a lot of money up front so don't take this challenge lightly!
            1: I play FPS like Halo 3, Cod, GoW, Etc. Its what the Xbox was designed for IMO!

            2: I use it for Netflix. I'd estimate that over half of Netflix's media is available via streaming HD video over Xbox Live. To watch Netflix you need a Gold Live account and you need to subscribe to netflix (plans start at $9 a month). Anyway, of all the things an Xbox does I'm most excited to tell people about Netflix as everything else is expected and is done on every other console. Netflix has its own "app" if you will where you can browse movies by type. Scrolling through you'll see Menu Titles like: New Release, Recommened for You, Your Instant Queue (A list of movies that you've already "Added" to watch later), Recently Watched, Drama, Action, Comedy, Sci-Fi, Romance, Foreign, Independent, Documentary etc.

            You can add/watch movies, TV Shows, Whole TV series... PBS Documentaries, The History Channel... for Halloween there was a Zombie Menu where I found a plethora of good and bad Zombie movies.

            Anyway, With each and every title you watch you can rate it out of 5 stars. If you like a particular movie Netflix will recommend other movies of the same genre, featuring the same actor, or movies liked by people who share your overall taste in entertainment... the more titles you rate the better it gets and sensing your likes and dislikes. Netflix eventually gives titles you haven't seen yet a rating it expects you to give it. Its pretty spot on.

            SO, you liked the Movie "Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels" and rated it 5 stars... Netflix will recommend "Snatch" and give it a Best Guess rating of 4.5 stars. And again, depending on your internet, its usually in HD.

            3: I play RPGs like Oblivion, Fallout or Dragon Age. The graphics are good and there is no "Memory Lag" that I always used to feel when I played these on any standard Desktop or Laptop.

            4: Free Demos. I have a 60GB hard drive with which to download dozens of free game demos before I commit to buying the full $60+ game... You usually get about 5% of the full game in a few actual levels, customized for the Demo, extra content like pictures, trailers, or Themes (which are like a Computers Desktop Pic) for free and can decide right away if I'm going to purchase the game or not.

            5: Arcade games and Games on Demand. Download full games and mini arcade games or useless apps for $1-$15 straight to your Hard Drive... I recently downloaded a Tower Defense Game, Uno, and Galaga (yes the original Galaga) that was remastered to not look like crap on 1080p (which is what I have going to my LCD) They are games that I could probably play online for free but I save the cost of owning a computer and i get to play them while reclining so win/win really. One of the sillier things I've seen is a scrolling LED display that you program to say whatever you want... the time, "Newman Sucks" or whatever.

            I just recently gave my girlfriend her own Xbox Live Gold account so that she can have her own custom Xbox experience... I already own 2 xboxes and I take 1 to work with me so is essence we each get our own xbox. Anyway, It suprises me how differently she sees and uses the Xbox compared to me. She has downloaded her own themes (desktop pics yet so much more), uses the rudimentary facebook app (sad i know), and just downloaded Diner Dash. She has also set up her own Last.fm account so she can listen to Lady GaGa and Queen while doing things around the apartment. Her favorite things to do via Xbox is Play Uno, Listen to music, and watch an endless slideshow of her, her friends, and our pugs facebook pictures. She's made her own avatar and purchased a pug that her avatar interacts with.

            I've dabbled with connecting a PC to my Xbox and its really easy but I haven't really used its features... just moved some music to my Xbox.

            Lets see... Total Costs
            Xbox (Arcade): $200
            Xbox Live Gold account: For one Year $50
            Extra Xbox Controller:$40
            HD Cables: (I think... mine came with the xbox via ebay) $40
            Better Hard Drive: (cheaper on Ebay) $90
            Netflix Per Month: $9

            With Taxes: $450+

            If you have any more questions about the Xbox or need anymore details feel free to ask as I like to spread the word about how awesome the Xbox is!

            Comment


            • #7
              Re: Thinking about buying a console (help needed)

              360 comes with HD cables IIRC. I have an Elite now so it came with a HDMI cable and HD cables, but I thought the Arcade should come with a split cable for HD and regular use.


              Comment


              • #8
                Re: Thinking about buying a console (help needed)

                They might have changed it but the Box for MY xbox that I'm looking at right now says an arcade gets Standard (I'm assuming Yellow, white, red) and that Pro and Elite get Standard/HD and that the elite also gets an HDMI... I know they also have VGA cables out and about as well for those who like that.

                Comment


                • #9
                  Re: Thinking about buying a console (help needed)

                  Originally posted by The Toxic Avenger View Post
                  I am a HUGE fan of the 360 but I'm not sure what all you want in a Entertainment System so I'll just tell you what my girlfriend and I do with ours.
                  Yes! This is what I'm looking for. Would love to see use cases for other people... it's really helpful.
                  This space for rent.

                  Comment


                  • #10
                    Re: Thinking about buying a console (help needed)

                    Ok, so I'm trying to figure out the difference between the $200 and $300 bundle. I'm switching back and forth between editions here:

                    http://www.amazon.com/Xbox-360-Arcad...2433291&sr=8-3

                    The extra $100 gets you...

                    - A black cover.
                    - A 120gig HD (internal, I assume)
                    - 2 games (that I won't play... can I sell them for anything?)

                    Stuff that's the same:
                    - Still only 1 controller
                    - Still no cables
                    - The pro talks about HD capability and an HDMI port and the arcade doesn't, but surely that's a shared feature right?
                    - Same with DVD... surely the Arcade can handle DVD, right? How's its upscanning capability?
                    - As a PC person, I'm assuming that when the xBox arcade says "256megs of memory" what they really mean is "storage." Is that right? The arcade comes without storage, the Pro comes with a big hard drive.

                    Basically the cost difference doesn't seem worth it unless it's the only way to add a hard drive, which doesn't seem to be the case. I'm still going to be springing for another controller and an HDMI cable. Is there anything else I'm likely to need?
                    This space for rent.

                    Comment


                    • #11
                      Re: Thinking about buying a console (help needed)

                      All hard drives on the 360 are EXTERNAL and portable. It's basically like having a giant memory card that you can pop on and off and take with you easily. I have the Elite which comes with the 120 GB hard drive and I think it's great, some big games run much quicker (loading screens stuff like that doesn't take as long) when you run them off the hard drive as opposed to the disc and having the extra space allows me to do that more often.

                      Anthem, I also believe that the Elite is the only Xbox that is compatible with HDMI, meaning the Pro and Arcade DO NOT have the HDMI hook up on the back.
                      Last edited by Trader Joe; 01-02-2010, 03:54 PM.


                      Comment


                      • #12
                        Re: Thinking about buying a console (help needed)

                        Originally posted by Indy View Post
                        I have the Elite which comes with the 120 GB hard drive and I think it's great, some big games run much quicker (loading screens stuff like that doesn't take as long) when you run them off the hard drive as opposed to the disc and having the extra space allows me to do that more often.
                        Gotcha. How much of that space do you actually use? Is the 120GB worth it over the 20GB?

                        Anthem, I also believe that the Elite is the only Xbox that is compatible with HDMI, meaning the Pro and Arcade DO NOT have the HDMI hook up on the back.
                        Wow, really? Gotta look into that. Anybody here have the XBox Arcade? Does it really not have HDMI?
                        This space for rent.

                        Comment


                        • #13
                          Re: Thinking about buying a console (help needed)

                          The hard drive is well worth it, obviously to save game files but to also download demos, videos, and expansion packs. The most important is the ability to burn games to the hard drive (you still have to have the game in the tray to play), this will help extend the life of your 360. However the hard drives are external so if you decide to go with the arcade, you can buy one later.

                          Yeah both play DVDs, but again to extend the life of the system, I wouldn't recommend using it as your primary DVD player. I assume it's just a run of the mill type anyway, since the HD-DVD add on was the upscaling player.
                          Originally posted by Natston;n3510291
                          I want the people to know that they still have 2 out of the 3 T.J.s working for them, and that ain't bad...

                          Comment


                          • #14
                            Re: Thinking about buying a console (help needed)

                            Originally posted by Anthem View Post


                            Wow, really? Gotta look into that. Anybody here have the XBox Arcade? Does it really not have HDMI?
                            I think still might... I bought a pro to replace my elite after it died, and it has an hdmi port. I'm looking at the box now, and for the arcade it says that cable is sold separately for the arcade. So I assume it has one as well, but hopefully someone can verify.
                            Originally posted by Natston;n3510291
                            I want the people to know that they still have 2 out of the 3 T.J.s working for them, and that ain't bad...

                            Comment


                            • #15
                              Re: Thinking about buying a console (help needed)

                              Yeah, I don't know I just remember when the Elite first came out they made a big deal about it having the HDMI port, maybe they started adding the port to the arcade and pro later on.

                              I think the 120 GB hard drive is worth it, but I don't remember off the top of my head how much space I use, but I think being able to burn the games to the hard drives is such a great thing especially for the big games i.e. I've used it for Oblivion and most recently for Forza 3.


                              Comment

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