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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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Home attendance average from 2005-present

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  • Home attendance average from 2005-present

    Year - Place - Average

    2010 (as of 3/17) - 27th - 13,872

    2009 - 28th - 14,182

    2008 - 30th - 12,221

    2007 - 28th - 15,359

    *2006 - 24th - 16,179

    *2005 - 17th - 16,994

    *-In the playoffs.

    We've done better since 2008. That was rough.

    Once all of our young guys are healthy and we start winning again, we'll gradually keep on improving.

    There isn't much of a difference between last season and this season.

    So all in all, I think it's taking time to rebuild for everyone. The franchise's time will shine in the near future. We'll be back in the playoffs with our young, core guys. We just need to draft well this summer and hope for the best going into next season.

    Here's the link for the league attendance.
    http://espn.go.com/nba/attendance

  • #2
    Re: Home attendance average from 2005-present

    I've always wondered about the actual turnstile numbers vs. reported attendance and what the net ticket income is (accounts for price of tickets).

    Supply and demand. Micro 101.

    Comment


    • #3
      Re: Home attendance average from 2005-present

      The headcases were putting W's in the record book and asses in the seats.

      Comment


      • #4
        Re: Home attendance average from 2005-present

        Are those attendance numbers or number of tickets that weren't available for sale either because they were purchased by ticket buyers or made available as comps (either of which isn't indicative of overall attendance... although should be the higher of the two numbers...)?

        Also, no matter which, do the increased numbers in 09 reflect people returning to the Pacers or do they reflect the impact of bargain basement ticket deals even on great seats?
        Nuntius was right for a while. I was wrong for a while. But ultimately I was right and Frank Vogel has been let go.

        ------

        "A player who makes a team great is more valuable than a great player. Losing yourself in the group, for the good of the group, that’s teamwork."

        -John Wooden

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        • #5
          Re: Home attendance average from 2005-present

          Originally posted by Bball View Post
          Are those attendance numbers or number of tickets that weren't available for sale either because they were purchased by ticket buyers or made available as comps (either of which isn't indicative of overall attendance... although should be the higher of the two numbers...)?

          Also, no matter which, do the increased numbers in 09 reflect people returning to the Pacers or do they reflect the impact of bargain basement ticket deals even on great seats?
          All it takes to count in attendance figures is that it was "purchased". The last couple of years it has not been uncommon to have free and comped tickets run through Ticketmaster so that everybody receiving them had to pay at least the Ticketmaster 0.75 fee to get them, therefore they were actually "sold" for free and counted in the released attendance.

          It is absolutely the case that the inflated attendance figures have had a LOT to do with bargain basement prices even on great seats, and it is also no accident that the actual ticket revenues are so rarely released, only the "attendance", which also includes the many seats that have been sold or comped that never are used, 5,000 or more in some games (I remember several instances on weeknights in 2007-08 and 2008-09 where the announced attendance was 11,000 or 12,000 and the lower bowl and club levels might have been about 25% filled, and the balcony was virtually empty with 10% or less filled by just looking around. With 25% in the lower and club, that was about 2,000 to 2,500 people actually in seats in those areas combined, and at a generous 10% in the balcony, that would have been about another 1,000, for a total on those nights of between 3,000 and 4,000 actually there. That left a discrepancy between actual people in seats vs. announced attendance of about 8,000 or so on those nights.

          So, I don't really put much faith in any "turnaround" from a financial standpoint despite improved announced attendance figures. It is very difficult to know, as fans, what the truth is regarding this issue because the league does not want fans to be fully aware of the difficulties facing it, especially regarding its weaker franchises, and I suspect that the main reason is that they don't want STH's to demand even deeper discounts going forward. It will be interesting to see what impact the "forced spending" renewal price increases the Pacers have gone with for next year will have on both attendance and the depth of discounts that are available to the general public comparatively.

          Comment


          • #6
            Re: Home attendance average from 2005-present

            Originally posted by GrangeRusHibbert View Post
            The headcases were putting W's in the record book and asses in the seats.
            You get that from?

            Between 2005 and 2006 you could say that the attendance dropped IN SPITE OF wins and getting into the playoffs. It is interesting to see that the ranking in 2006 dropped by 7 places, which (absent other info) says league-wide attendance dropped less (or perhaps even increased). How does that translate to "the headcases were putting ... asses in the seats"?

            I'd be very interested in the 2003 and 2004 numbers. Sure, 2004-2005 is skewed by the suspensions, but it would give us a better idea of the effect to compare (say) 2003-2004 with 2005-2006.

            I agree they weren't the only effect on attendance, but this rose-colored-glasses idea that the city embraced those guys and only said they disliked them to look good is bogus.
            BillS

            A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.
            Or throw in a first-round pick and flip it for a max-level point guard...

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            • #7
              Re: Home attendance average from 2005-present

              Originally posted by BillS View Post
              You get that from?
              Increased attendance and winning percentages.
              Last edited by Lance George; 03-18-2010, 03:05 PM.

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              • #8
                Re: Home attendance average from 2005-present

                I am married with 2 kids. My son is 7 and is a pacers fanatic. I work swing shifts and weekends, so it is hard for me to go to games. We usually go to a few games a year, but this year we only went to the first game. Third Eye Blind rocked before the game and my son loved that too. Anyway if they start winning and playing better I can justify (to myself) going to more games.

                I think I sat behind some of you at that game. Under the basket on the side where the pacers enter from about 12 or so rows up. Was that any of you. It was against Miami.

                Comment


                • #9
                  Re: Home attendance average from 2005-present

                  Originally posted by BillS View Post
                  You get that from?

                  Between 2005 and 2006 you could say that the attendance dropped IN SPITE OF wins and getting into the playoffs. It is interesting to see that the ranking in 2006 dropped by 7 places, which (absent other info) says league-wide attendance dropped less (or perhaps even increased). How does that translate to "the headcases were putting ... asses in the seats"?

                  I'd be very interested in the 2003 and 2004 numbers. Sure, 2004-2005 is skewed by the suspensions, but it would give us a better idea of the effect to compare (say) 2003-2004 with 2005-2006.

                  I agree they weren't the only effect on attendance, but this rose-colored-glasses idea that the city embraced those guys and only said they disliked them to look good is bogus.


                  What you really want to look at are the 2008 numbers. Attendance figures can't drop immediately, because they're heavily driven by corporate and private season tickets.

                  Attendance in 2005 was strong because (1) they started the year as a serious championship contender, (2) there was an us vs. the world feeling after the brawl that morphed into (3) let's say goodbye to Reggie and get to see him one last time. Most tickets were sold early, but the house stayed full for most of the year.

                  There wasn't a huge dropoff in 2006 because, despite the departure of Reggie, the Pacers were still considered serious contenders. They didn't start well, but were still well regarded when Artest decided to ask out. The rest of the season was bad, but only in a this team is joyless and uninspiring kind of way. The Brawl still was the only significant non-basketball sin committed, and much of the fanbase did not then (and does not now) hold the Pacers wholly responsible for that incident (whether they should be or not).

                  The 2006 season ended on a sour note, but nothing earth shaking. They had limped into the playoffs at .500, and the future was definitely looking cloudy on the court. There were calls to get rid of some of the players, most notably Tinsley and Jackson, but it was largely based on simply not liking them as players, as opposed to any ingrained dislike of them as human beings...at least not as a general notion

                  One of the things that happens a lot is that the brawl is blamed for everything about the situation the Pacers find themselves in now. That's not true. The brawl broke the back of that group as a contender, but it didn't break the relationship between the Pacers and a large portion of the ticket buying public.

                  The events of the 2007 season did that. Just as the Pacers started the well-intentioned, but horribly timed "It's up to us" season, Club Rio happened. The campaign was aimed at cleaning up their on-court image, but was demolished by off-court stupidity.

                  The season meandered into January with the team hovering around .500, and Stephen Jackson still largely nurturing his status as pariah by, among other things, getting sent to the locker room in a game at Cleveland (IIRC) for cussing out Carlisle. This led to the Murphleavy trade in mid-January, but any fresh air that moving Jackson may have created was sucked out of the room by the incident with Tinsley and Daniels at 8 Seconds.

                  At that point in time, a large portion of the fan base said, "**** this, we're outta here. We'll be back when you get rid of these idiots, and you start winning." It's obvious from the 20% drop in attendance that season ticket holders left in droves. (That decline, by the way, was larger than the attendance drop in Seattle, and they were sure they were losing the team. If you exclude the Pacers, the Sonics (who were moving), and the Hornets (who had returned to the still struggling NO after selling out every game in OKC), NBA attendance was only down 0.3%.)

                  We got into this situation, from both an attendance and a performance perspective, because of the headcases.

                  We are still in this situation, because we haven't figured out how to start winning again.

                  Pointing to the record (a whopping 98-95 between the brawl and the Murphleavy trade) and the attendance, and using it as proof that we should have kept the headcases has to be one of the silliest things I've ever seen.

                  It is roughly the same as discovering your house is infested with termites, exterminating them, only to have your house collapse because of the damage already done, then saying, "Hell, we should have kept the termites, because when we had the termites, we had a house."
                  Last edited by count55; 03-18-2010, 03:50 PM.

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