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Community standards and participation guidelines

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Last revision: 08/07/2008

The guardian.co.uk site provides a growing number of opportunities for readers who wish to discuss content we publish, or debate more generally, in discussions related to specific blog posts as well as on our talk boards.

Our aim is to ensure this platform is inclusive and safe, and that guardian.co.uk is the place on the net where you will always find lively, entertaining and, above all, intelligent discussions.

There are 10 guidelines which we expect all participants in the community areas of guardian.co.uk to abide by:

1. We welcome debate and dissent, but the key to maintaining guardian.co.uk as an inviting space is to stick to the passionate discussion of issues. We actively discourage obscenity and mindless abuse. Personal attacks on other users or authors have no place in an intelligent discussion. Similarly, we welcome criticism of the articles we publish, but will not tolerate persistent misrepresentation of the Guardian and the journalists published on the website. For the sake of robust debate, we will distinguish between constructive, focused argument and smear tactics.

2. Please respect other people's views and beliefs and consider their impact when making your contribution. We understand that people often feel strongly about issues debated on the site, but we will consider removing any content that others might find extremely offensive or threatening. We reserve the right to redirect or curtail conversations which descend into flame-wars based on ingrained partisanship or generalisations. We don't want to stop people discussing topics they are enthusiastic about, but we do ask that users find a way of sharing their views that does not feel divisive, threatening or toxic to others.

3. We will not tolerate racism, sexism, homophobia or other forms of hate-speech, or content that could be interpreted as such. We recognise the difference between criticising a particular government, organisation, community or belief and attacking people on the basis of their race, religion, gender or sexual orientation.

4. We appreciate that we have an international audience, but since we publish content in English, the language of conversation on the site should also be English. As such, contributions that cannot be understood by the majority of participants may be removed.

5. We will remove any content that may put us in legal jeopardy, such as potentially libellous or defamatory postings, or material posted in potential breach of copyright. We understand that you may wish to quote from external sources, but please try and refrain from copying and pasting extensively, which not only slows down the discussion, but potentially leads to copyright problems. It's definitely better to post a short quote or synopsis and a link to the original article.

6. We will remove any posts that are obviously commercial or otherwise spam-like. Our aim is that this site should provide a space for people to interact with our content and each other, and we frown on commercial entities passing themselves off as individuals. There are technology features in place, which can help to identify spam in content or delivery form and prevent it from being published on the site, but some may slip through.

7. Think before you press the publish button. Remember that this is a public forum, and your words will be archived on this site and available for anyone to find for a long time - the web has a very long memory.

8. Keep it relevant. The vast majority of conversations on guardian.co.uk relate to a specific blog post or topic within a talk board. We know that some conversations can be wide-ranging, but if you post something which is unrelated to the original topic then it may be removed, in order to keep the thread on track. The same applies to queries about moderation - these should not be posted as comments.

9. The platform is ours, but the conversation belongs to everybody. We want this to be a welcoming space for intelligent discussion, and we expect participants to help us achieve this by notifying us of potential problems and helping each other to keep conversations inviting and intelligent.

10. And remember ... Text isn't always a great medium for conversation: tone of voice - sarcasm, humour and so on - doesn't always come across when using words on a screen. Be aware that you may be misunderstood, so try to be clear about what you are saying, and expect that people may understand your contribution differently than you intended. To keep the guardian.co.uk community areas open to all viewpoints do help by maintaining a reasonable tone, even in unreasonable circumstances!

In short, if you act with maturity and consideration for other users, you should have no problems.

For those pressed for time, the condensed version of these community standards is:

- Show and share the intelligence, wisdom and humour we know you possess. Don't be unpleasant.
- Take some responsibility for the quality of the community in which you're participating. Help make it better and it will be.

Remember that by registering for guardian.co.uk you have also agreed to our terms and conditions. These guidelines may change - so please bookmark this page and check back frequently.

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Our community management team are empowered to help create and maintain a healthy and positive environment. Above all, we reserve the right to take steps or implement measures which we hope will benefit the whole community of guardian.co.uk community participants.

There is an extensive Community FAQ which we hope will answer any questions you have about interaction functionality and moderation process.

Interaction with users and community activity

In addition to the above, there are seven main ways the community management team interacts with people participating in conversations within the guardian.co.uk site.

1. While guardian.co.uk staff try to keep an eye on all community activity, we also rely on our users to report abusive, offensive or otherwise inappropriate comments when they spot them, by clicking on the "report abuse" link which appears next to each comment. Since most comments are post-moderated, you may see a problematic contribution before a moderator has, and it is worth using the report facility to resolve issues quickly. We urge our communities to use this feature to allow us to make the space better for everyone. When we all take responsibility for maintaining an appropriate and welcoming environment, the debate itself is improved and all those involved benefit.

2. We will, when necessary, remove postings or comments from our bulletin boards, articles, and blog posts. If a contribution to guardian.co.uk is perceived as breaching the community guidelines set out above, then it will be removed by the community team. We hope this doesn't seem heavy-handed, and we don't really like doing it, but we believe it's the best way to keep the experience within the community areas of the site right for the vast majority of the people who visit. (We are sometimes asked why we don't leave attacks or offensive comments in place so those reading can identify 'trolling' for themselves. That would effectively leave the site unmoderated and the community standards unenforced, which we don't think would be good for the conversation.)

3. Even if only part of a comment or posting is perceived as breaching the community guidelines, the whole thing may be removed. We will not edit user posts to change the meaning, spelling, or anything else intended by the user.

4. Sometimes, when a comment or post is removed, it is necessary to delete subsequent messages which refer to explicitly or quote from the original (removed) comment, in order to preserve some notion of conversational thread. This may also happen because a later comment quotes directly the problematic bits of the original comment, which just perpetuates the problem. In such cases not every deletion will be marked individually, as this then clutters the comments. Instead, the marker in the original comment will indicate what has been done.

5. When a comment or talk board discussion gets extremely long, a moderator may leave a warning in the thread and suggest that the conversation be restarted elsewhere where possible. This is because long threads slow the system down for everyone. We may also do this when conversations stray wildly off-track. Shortly after the posted warning, the thread may be closed and/or deleted. Long discussions or messages will be removed at the editor's discretion.

6. Participants who seriously, persistently or wilfully ignore the community standards, participation guidelines or terms and conditions will have their posting privileges for all guardian.co.uk community areas withdrawn. This is not an action that we take lightly, or arbitrarily. However, we are aiming to create and maintain an online experience consistent with Guardian values, and we reserve the right to make decisions which we feel support that. Prior to any such suspension, the participant will be warned, and given a chance to modify their approach. Please be aware that moderators may contact you by email in relation to your participation, especially where an issue comes up in relation to these community standards.

7. Moderation is more than just dealing with problems. Sometimes we'll join a comment thread or talk board topic to help focus (or refocus) the discussion, or to get people talking.

In short, our overarching aim is never to curtail conversation, but to create and maintain a pleasant and welcoming environment for everyone.

If you have suggestions or questions about any aspect of community participation on guardian.co.uk, you can write to community.suggestions@guardian.co.uk.

For queries about your user account, you should contact userhelp@guardian.co.uk