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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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George Floyd Protests and Riots

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  • Some of them were climbing the side of a stair case that they could have just walked up smh

    Comment


    • Originally posted by Taterhead View Post

      Well they have been warning the country of how dangerous Trump is and well....here we are.....
      Exactly. All of the people in the media who predicted Donald Trump would be an existential threat to American democracy look pretty smart right now.

      Comment


      • This is just wild

        Republicans that propagated the lie, even after courts threw them out, really ought to be held accountable for the cop and these peoples deaths. At minimum they should be thrown out of office.

        Comment


        • Just saw on the news that Trump was suspended from Twitter. Not sure what caused it.

          Comment


          • Originally posted by shags View Post

            Exactly. All of the people in the media who predicted Donald Trump would be an existential threat to American democracy look pretty smart right now.
            Haha. "existential threat to American Democracy"? There were a couple thousand people walking to the capitol as a crowd. A fraction of them did something incredibly stupid, had no plan, shot no guns, didn't burn a single thing...and it was all over in a matter of a few hours. I've seen concerts wilder than that. You people are completely blowing it out of proportion in terms of what the protesters actually accomplished or even had the intent and capability to accomplish.

            It's all sexy because Trump lit the fire....and they invaded the Capitol. I get that. But it wasn't any coup or....my god...existential threat to American Democracy.

            In fact, those protesters probably gave the US government a great wake-up call to protect our institutions better from external threats of attack where the people may well have a small army and to be sure they would be firing rounds.

            Comment


            • Originally posted by shags View Post
              Just saw on the news that Trump was suspended from Twitter. Not sure what caused it.
              Big Tech is so ready to flush him. Now is their chance and frankly he earned it this time.

              Comment


              • Accused.

                OK, let's assume that is a true report. I heard no reports of protesters...no I will call them rioters to help you...actually using guns or bombs. Not one report. Yes, when you get the fringe out there they are going to HAVE guns but frankly all kinds of people walk around every day loaded up. I've got one right here sitting on my desk.

                Molotov cocktails? Why would they NOT have thrown them if there was a chance they might? They were all over the building.

                So no, it's all sexy I know. They didn't do much really.

                Comment


                • Originally posted by BlueNGold View Post

                  Haha. "existential threat to American Democracy"? There were a couple thousand people walking to the capitol as a crowd. A fraction of them did something incredibly stupid, had no plan, shot no guns, didn't burn a single thing...and it was all over in a matter of a few hours. I've seen concerts wilder than that. You people are completely blowing it out of proportion in terms of what the protesters actually accomplished or even had the intent and capability to accomplish.

                  It's all sexy because Trump lit the fire....and they invaded the Capitol. I get that. But it wasn't any coup or....my god...existential threat to American Democracy.

                  In fact, those protesters probably gave the US government a great wake-up call to protect our institutions better from external threats of attack where the people may well have a small army and to be sure they would be firing rounds.
                  Over half the House Republicans voted to throw out a states electoral votes and there would have been more states contested had the Republican Senators went along with it. Just that act is an existential threat to Democracy.

                  Comment


                  • Originally posted by Taterhead View Post

                    Well they have been warning the country of how dangerous Trump is and well....here we are.....
                    So you believe at face value what is printed/published on the web without getting corroborating proof. If you do, you are being led by the nose. I don't disbelieve everything I read but I look at it with a healthy dose of skepticism because there is no such thing as unbiased news. The US is a lot like Mother Russia now with its news. At least we have two choices, however biased they may be.

                    Or is only Fox biased? Is that right?

                    Comment


                    • Originally posted by CJ Jones View Post

                      Over half the House Republicans voted to throw out a states electoral votes and there would have been more states contested had the Republican Senators went along with it. Just that act is an existential threat to Democracy.
                      Nope. That is the definition of Democracy. It doesn't sit well with you I know. I suppose you just want to live in a dictatorship controlled by liberals, isn't that right?

                      Comment


                      • Originally posted by BlueNGold View Post

                        Accused.

                        OK, let's assume that is a true report. I heard no reports of protesters...no I will call them rioters to help you...actually using guns or bombs. Not one report. Yes, when you get the fringe out there they are going to HAVE guns but frankly all kinds of people walk around every day loaded up. I've got one right here sitting on my desk.

                        Molotov cocktails? Why would they NOT have thrown them if there was a chance they might? They were all over the building.

                        So no, it's all sexy I know. They didn't do much really.
                        Are you saying Fox News would lie about someone having 11 Molotov cocktails? Check that, are you saying Fox News is fake news?

                        I am a card carrying members of the NRA. I understand carrying a weapon. I also know DC (and MD) gun laws are stupid strict. I’m going to go out on a limb and say some/ most, probably most, folks carrying do not have the appropriate CCPL.

                        Its cool tough. I see your POV. When I show up to peaceful protests I often show up with pipe booms, Molotov cocktails, and lots of guns. I mean - just last month I showed up with all that but was super off I forgot my cigars and whiskey.

                        Comment


                        • Man photographed carrying speaker's lectern in Capitol insurrection, identified as Adam Christian Johnson, 36, of Parrish, Fla., never voted for Trump: Voter registration records show he is non-party affiliated, hasn't voted in any election since he first registered in Sept 2002.


                          4:52 PM ? Jan 8, 2021

                          Comment


                          • Daniel Dale
                            @ddale8
                            Jan 8, 2021

                            For anyone confused: Trump’s exec order did not order 10 years in prison for anyone. It just told the govt. to fully prosecute people arrested for damaging monuments/federal property. 10 years is an existing *max* sentence judges can choose, or not. They can also choose a fine.


                            Daniel Dale
                            @ddale8
                            I know some people are saying the “10 years for these people!” thing just to make a point. But some seem to think Trump actually created a “10 years in prison for rioters” law - which is what Trump claimed, but it was always false.
                            11:10 PM ? Jan 8, 2021



                            Comment


                            • IF TRUE this is epic


                              Emma Kennedy
                              @EmmaKennedy
                              Jan 8, 2021

                              It seems the insurrectionist who died during his assault on the capitol, a man who wrote on Parler he was going “to ***** this country up” accidentally tasered himself in the balls while trying to steal a painting, triggering a heart attack. Paging the Darwin Awards.


                              Jonathan Cohen, PhD (the other Dr) ✘
                              @electronlove
                              Kevin Greeson but who knows if the taser is true.

                              Comment


                              • Originally posted by BlueNGold View Post

                                Nope. That is the definition of Democracy. It doesn't sit well with you I know. I suppose you just want to live in a dictatorship controlled by liberals, isn't that right?
                                Attempting to overthrow a free and fair election on a provable set of lies is not Democracy. That's the type of **** they do in Putin's Russia.

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