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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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Why does it have to be this way?????

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  • #16
    Re: Why does it have to be this way?????

    Originally posted by vapacersfan
    Yeah, you can dog me for that. I cant even spell "mood" corectly
    Or "correctly".

    “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

    Comment


    • #17
      Re: Why does it have to be this way?????

      Originally posted by Los Angeles
      Or "correctly".

      I was just going to say that. VA you need to watch out for that jonk!

      Comment


      • #18
        Re: Why does it have to be this way?????

        Originally posted by rcarey
        Although, we gave the miracle a chance.
        I suppose. At the same time, you can easily imagine the reverse worst case scenario (which we've all seen happen on occasion). Defender agressively closes out, loses balance ever so slightly bumping the shooter, and zebra calls a ridiculous touch foul. 3 shots or a 4-pt play. I know. It's remote, but not much more remote than the chances of Manu hitting the shot he took. Kinda sounds like the phantom AD-Grandma-ma 4 pt play of Pacer lore. At any rate, I respect your point. I personally would not identify it as a central reason why we lost the game, however.
        I'd rather die standing up than live on my knees.

        -Emiliano Zapata

        Comment


        • #19
          Re: Why does it have to be this way?????

          Originally posted by Peck
          So, for today, could we not analyze this to death?
          Why? Why is this game any different than the games you break down and "analyze to death" (which I enjoy, I might add)? You heap praise and lay blame in those threads. The emotions you see on display here are an indication that we actually expected to win this game. I don't see a problem with it. True, there's a lot to like about our effort today, but we should have won that game and there are legitimate arguments to be made and discussions to be had about why we didn't.

          Comment


          • #20
            Re: Why does it have to be this way?????

            this is why I didnt come post after the game. I WAS SOOOOOOO MAD. We win the game if Sarunas finished the 4h quarter, but regardless its not worth talking about.
            *removed* Just keep politics and religion completely out of it, please.

            Comment


            • #21
              Re: Why does it have to be this way?????

              Originally posted by Peck
              BTW, on the bench front today from what I could see, Jermaine & Jamaal both were big time supporters from the sidelines.
              Hope JO doesn't have a case of acid reflux or diarrhea when you are checking out his emotions.

              Good effort, by the way, is a way for losers to console themselves. I doubt the Pacers are content with today's results. I'm not. For whatever reason the Pacers were shut down when it counted by the Spurs. Hasn't Carlisle figured out a play coming out of a time out that can put the ball in scoring position in Peja's hands?

              I booed when Sarunas and Peja were taken out of the game. Neither was near tired and both were on a roll. My coaching book says when in doubt you go with the hot hand - particularly when the players you are subbing in are sometimes iffy.

              Carlisle says he put in Jackson over Peja for defensive reasons. Oh really? If it was defense he wanted where was Granger who is infinitely better defensively as a small forward than either Peja or Jackson?

              I think the subtitution that came from Rick was more out of concern of the feelings of AJ and Jackson. There I said it - No proof, but it's my only explanation for taking Peja and Sarunas out of the ball game with less than 5 minutes left when they and the team were playing so well and the House was electric with excitement.

              Comment


              • #22
                Re: Why does it have to be this way?????

                Thats exactly what it was. He didnt want Jack and AJ to be mad at him so he put them back in and thats another one of his flaws. Who the hell does that? You think Pop would have put Parker in if Van Exel was lighting our *** up? Nope. Only our coach thinks about that.

                Comment


                • #23
                  Re: Why does it have to be this way?????

                  Originally posted by sixthman
                  I think the subtitution that came from Rick was more out of concern of the feelings of AJ and Jackson.
                  I said the same thing to Kstat right after the game and he basically laughed at me.

                  Comment


                  • #24
                    Re: Why does it have to be this way?????

                    Originally posted by sixthman
                    I think the subtitution that came from Rick was more out of concern of the feelings of AJ and Jackson. There I said it - No proof, but it's my only explanation for taking Peja and Sarunas out of the ball game with less than 5 minutes left when they and the team were playing so well and the House was electric with excitement.
                    If thats the case, then Rick should be fired.
                    "Remember the pain of my fist. That is my power!"

                    Comment


                    • #25
                      Re: Why does it have to be this way?????

                      Who are you and what have you done with Peck!!!

                      Peck is the person who brings darkness in the time of light, so obviously you are a !!!
                      “Seventy percent of me talking on the court is personally for me to get me
                      motivated and going. Thirty percent is to see if I can get into the opponent’s head.”
                      Reggie Miller

                      Comment


                      • #26
                        Re: Why does it have to be this way?????

                        Originally posted by Harmonica
                        I said the same thing to Kstat right after the game and he basically laughed at me.
                        Well, in that event, we need to reevaluate our thinking. I mean it's Kstat after all.

                        What else is the explanation? Why take Peja and Sarunas out of a game when he they are our best players on the floor? Jermainiac said it really well, "You think Pop would have put Parker in if Van Exel was lighting our *** up? Nope."

                        Comment


                        • #27
                          Re: Why does it have to be this way?????

                          This thread makes me a little uneasy.

                          I think criticizing Rick for what were bad substitutions IMO at a crucial time in the game is PRECISELY what PD is supposed to do. You certainly can't read such criticism in the Star or pacers.com.

                          I hope some on this board are not starting to get ashamed of good ol' solid unrepentant criticism because the likes of Mark Boyle and others are known to reguarly read the forum.

                          I've been an investigative journalist for many years. It's the very saltiness and ruthlessness that makes you powerful and effective. No need to be ashamed of it.

                          McKeyFan
                          "Look, it's up to me to put a team around ... Lance right now." —Kevin Pritchard press conference

                          Comment


                          • #28
                            Re: Why does it have to be this way?????

                            Public message to VA and Soup:

                            Here's a mood for you. :finger:

                            (I was going to post but I decided that might be too violent.)

                            Comment


                            • #29
                              Re: Why does it have to be this way?????

                              Originally posted by Fireball Kid
                              If thats the case, then Rick should be fired.
                              I'm not in that camp. Although I think he'd be a great fit at IU, but that's another story for later.

                              I think Rick deserves some slack here. He is doing a credible job in building a team, a team in the best sense of the word. He's still learning about his players, in this case AJ, Sarunas, Peja and Jack. But this time I think by not doing the obvious and easy, he may have cost a game. Nothing fatal, if something is learned.

                              Comment


                              • #30
                                Re: Why does it have to be this way?????

                                Originally posted by Peck
                                I don't have time for a game recap at the moment, I'll try & work on one later this P.M.

                                But I get on here & I see nothing but threads about how Rick blew the game, how Jax blew the game, how A.J. blew the game, etc., etc.

                                We just took the defending W.C. to the wire in a very exciting playoff atmosphere type game.

                                Manu misses that running 28' shot after our stellar defense & we would be looking at a differant end result.

                                I'm proud as hell of the Pacers today.

                                Am I dissapointed we lost? Yes. Does it hurt? Hell yes.

                                But I take that pain as a sign of life, I care. If I didn't care then this loss wouldn't hurt so bad.

                                Were there goats at the end of the game? Sure, but some of those same goats got you the lead to begin with.

                                We left it all on the floor & that is all that I ever ask of our team.

                                BTW, on the bench front today from what I could see, Jermaine & Jamaal both were big time supporters from the sidelines.

                                I feel bad for our guys but I don't want a dang one of them to hang thier heads in shame.

                                They battled as hard as they could & I assure you the Spurs didn't walk off of the floor without feeling like they had been in a war.

                                So, for today, could we not analyze this to death? We played, we fought & we lost to the defending champs who are on a roll.
                                Thank you. I feel exactly the same way. This team is for real, folks. It's time to stop analyzing and criticizing everything to death, and start being what we all started out being: Fans that cheer on our team for the good things that they do. It's time to get excited, not dissect everything until there's nothing pretty left to look at.

                                Dancing fruit!

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