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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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COVID-19

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  • Originally posted by Gamble1 View Post

    So in the policy making of public health death is the only determining outcome for you?

    This is the problem with the logic of using death rates. I have a friend who son is 19 years old and had the virus. He was hospitalized for 8 days and has to use an inhaler to walk around the block. His lung function may never come back and he was a healthy kid before this. Until we track health outcomes of people besides death you can not be confident that you are not putting people at a major risk for poor health outcomes.
    No, but I wouldn’t put much weight on one anecdotal. I also wouldn’t ignore all of the ramifications for everyone staying locked down.

    Comment


    • Originally posted by vnzla81 View Post

      I love it when I talk to people in person and they try to corner me by talking s*** about Obama/Biden/Hillary/Pelosy/Schummer and I go like "yeah they are s*** too", they get speechless real quick lol


      I think both sides are going to realize how much s*** both parties are very soon, I don't think politicians are ready for what is coming.
      That’s why you vote on the person and not the party. I’ll take Holcomb over Pence every time

      Comment


      • I believe the US population of 55yrs old and above is about 30%. So that calculation would need to be factored in when trying to do hard numbers on just who would die in a "herd immunity" attempt and just letting Covid-19 burn thru the population.

        I've not ran the numbers to break it down amongst age groups, but just running conservative numbers pretty much showed that in the US, attempting to run things normally and just let Covid-19 happen is a pipe dream.
        You just get to choose your economic collapse- A controlled collapse thru mitigation strategies with hospitals not being overwhelmed or a chaotic collapse with the medical system entirely overwhelmed with illness and death and businesses closed not because they're deemed non-essential but because their owners died, employees fell ill, or citizens rioted and burned them to the ground after looting them.
        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

        Comment


        • I'll take the version that gives us at least the semblance of control, and some ability to manage things within boundaries and a tap to be loosened or tightened with measured approaches.

          Ideally, with some organized, centralized guidelines, but that ship has sailed with Trump's lack of leadership ability and general chaotic response.
          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

          Comment


          • It'll be interesting to see how the rape apologists spin this as somehow being Trump's fault. TDS is a hell of a drug.

            China asked the WHO to cover up the coronavirus outbreak: German intelligence service - Taiwan News

            Originally posted by Matthew Strong, Taiwan News
            TAIPEI (Taiwan News) – Chinese leader Xi Jinping (習近平) asked World Health Organization (WHO) Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus to suppress news about the Wuhan coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak, the German intelligence agency BND found, according to a report by German magazine Der Spiegel.

            During a conversation on Jan. 21, Xi reportedly asked Tedros not to announce that the virus could be transmitted between humans and to delay any declaration of a coronavirus pandemic.

            It took until the end of January before the WHO declared the coronavirus outbreak needed to receive international attention. Because of China’s delay, the world wasted four to six weeks it could have used better to counter the virus from spreading, the BND concluded.

            Germany’s Robert Koch Institute also said that China failed to reveal all relevant information at the outset of the epidemic, leading it to turn to the BND for advice, according to a report in the Sueddeutsche Zeitung quoted by CNA.

            In a response to the German media reports, Chinese diplomats said the opposite was true, arguing that the communist country’s handling of the virus had saved time which had been wasted by governments in other countries.

            Comment


            • Open or not open... A little... a lot?? Testing, testing, testing.
              Data, Data, Data.... We need it.

              https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=830810847441824
              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

              Comment


              • Originally posted by Gamble1 View Post

                You are assuming the exponential growth started at the same time for the entire nation. We know that is not the case so any extrapolation is flawed from that perspective. It will most certainly be regional. The good thing is that roche has a legit antibody test now and will be used nationally. We should know shortly how prevalent it is soon.
                Not sure you can bank on exponential growth being that common. The first death in the US was a 57 year old woman in Santa Clara County. Santa Clara is part of Silicon Valley, an area with a tremendous amount of global travel and that 30% of their population is from Asia, the source of the virus. It is highly likely that Santa Clara is pretty far along the curve. Yet the curve for them isn't that bad. If this is their "exponential growth", it isn't that scary.

                In Santa Clara and many other areas of the nation, here are a few greater concerns:

                1) People are dying because they are not able to have surgeries.
                2) Domestic violence has increased due to the virus. Women and children are dying.
                3) Higher levels of suicide due to isolation. The distress hotline increased 338% from February to March.
                4) Higher firearms purchases. More death.
                5) Stress - untold amount of impact on people's health that will lead to many deaths.
                6) Inability to access gym facilities and get exercise. Considering this impacts millions of people, people will die from this.
                7) More substance abuse.

                I'm not sure there is an end to this list. If the economy craters, that will lead to more stress, depression, suicide and death. It might even change our way of life.

                Comment


                • I agree with V about one thing. Only the Bernie/E.Warren/AOC crowd are true believers in socieital change. Biden, Clinton, Gore, etc., are more than happy for big business to line their pockets while they lie to "the little guy" about helping him. Bill Clinton lied so much he signed NAFTA and destroyed countless lower middle class family's lives. Yet he's Dem jesus.

                  As for the true believers, I am clear on what they want. But what they want is the polar opposite of what made the US great and what makes people want to emigrate to the US. It's called opportunity. The issue is if you just hand people housing, healthcare, a government stipend, free schools, free libraries, free cell phones, no more loan payments, next there will be free cars for free Uber cards. All this stuff. If you give it to people they have no motivation to get better and work which has always been why the US has gotten stronger. Motivation is a powerful thing. Take that away and it's the beginning of the end.

                  Edit: BTW, we have a good example of this at work over the last 50 years. While divorce increased, multigenerational dependence on welfare also increased. The nuclear family disintegrated. It did because people, rather than work on their marriages, took the easy way out. People have become so selfish. So now we have many single parent homes where little Johnny isn't watched while mom is at work. Other people just stay home and live off the gov'ment. It has been an utter disaster. Point is, more free stuff and far more people and families fall apart and society just collapses.
                  Last edited by BlueNGold; 05-09-2020, 11:03 PM.

                  Comment


                  • Hey V. Would it make you happy if every family were given a house. Each person would get his 500 Sq Ft. So a family of 4 would get a brand new 2000 Sq Ft. house at no cost to them. Each person would also get their $2000/month check. All this would be paid with whatever the fat cats make either in their companies or in the market. So really, there is no need to work. This stuff just appears out of thin air for them because it's what they deserve, right? Each person, in addition to the 13 years they currently get at no cost, would also get "free" college whether or not they are college material or listened even for a minute in high school. Your dream?

                    Comment


                    • I am not sure if this is accurate. If so kind of scary.



                      https://www.independent.co.uk/news/health/coronavirus-summer-temperature-warm-hot-spread-study-pandemic-a9506201.html?utm_term=Autofeed&utm_medium=Soc ial&utm_source=Twitter#Echobox=1588971997

                      Dr Peter Juni, of the University of Toronto, said in a press release that the team found little or no link between infection spread and temperature or latitude, and only a weak association with humidity.

                      Comment


                      • Originally posted by BlueNGold View Post
                        4) Higher firearms purchases. More death.
                        I’m not tracking. Simply selling more guns does not Mean more deaths

                        Comment


                        • Originally posted by vapacersfan View Post

                          I’m not tracking. Simply selling more guns does not Mean more deaths
                          I’m glad you agreed with 6 of the 7.

                          I actually agree. I almost pulled that. It was inserted more for liberals who normally will believe that.

                          Comment


                          • Originally posted by BlueNGold View Post

                            I’m glad you agreed with 6 of the 7.

                            I actually agree. I almost pulled that. It was inserted more for liberals who normally will believe that.
                            Please do not confuse me commenting on one [in my opinion extreme] of your examples as agreeing or disagreeing with the other 6

                            Comment


                            • I love all the TDS articles and posts that spell bleach “bleech”. They truly have no sense at all after the TDS virus mangled their intellect. Imagine what happens when Trump is re-elected.

                              Comment


                              • Originally posted by vapacersfan View Post

                                Please do not confuse me commenting on one [in my opinion extreme] of your examples as agreeing or disagreeing with the other 6
                                Ok. But as for your other post are you saying that liberals don’t blame guns for deaths? You think that is extreme yet millions of liberals believe it?
                                Last edited by BlueNGold; 05-10-2020, 08:45 AM.

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