Self-promotion and spamming: not on A to Z Forums

Discussion in 'Forum Announcements & FAQ' started by TeacherGroupie, Nov 8, 2017.

  1. TeacherGroupie

    TeacherGroupie Moderator

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    Nov 8, 2017

    This is a friendly reminder that A to Z Forums moderators will delete a thread or post that serves primarily to pitch a service offered by the posting member or to direct traffic to the member's website.

    A member who persists in posting advertisements or links can expect to be banned from A to Z Forums for spamming.

    Let me add that no rule prevents someone with a commercial enterprise from joining A to Z and participating helpfully in discussions here. Being generous with one's expertise helps the community and can establish one's credibility to the point that other members will seek one out. But plastering half or more of one's first ten posts with a pitch and a link simply makes one look like a shill.
     
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  3. TeacherGroupie

    TeacherGroupie Moderator

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    Nov 12, 2017

    Other offenses that A to Z moderation may view as ban-worthy include (but are not necessarily limited to) the following:

    • Persisting in using obscene or blasphemous language
    • Persisting in using abusive language toward another A to Z member
    • Creating and posting under more than one username, especially after a previous username has been banned
    • Persisting in challenging moderators' judgment as regards posts or threads that have been deleted or unapproved or as regards banning (and, yes, this CAN mean castigating a moderator who hasn't unapproved a post or banned a member that you believe should be banned)

    These are obviously not spamming in the strict sense, though they are labeled as spam in the mechanism that the forum software provides for banning a member and for generating an automatic message for the banned member.
     
  4. TeacherGroupie

    TeacherGroupie Moderator

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    May 15, 2018

    Judging from some posts made today, it seems that this reminder needs to be repeated. As I have noted above, there's nothing wrong with joining A to Z and being generous with one's expertise - but it is against forum policy to attempt to steer traffic away from A to Z.

    It is also bad form to try to twist forums to purposes for which they weren't intended.

    Violators may well find themselves banned.
     
    futuremathsprof likes this.

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