Forum Etiquette

[gozetec02]

[Begin Disclaimer]This post is not intended to offend or upset anyone including members and visitors.[End Disclaimer]

Ok to begin with these forums are intended to help, educate, and to share our experiences with each other. I have been to many other forums where people are always putting each other down and calling people morons and what not.

When a forum is posted here the replies are not meant to upset anyone. The collective experience here equates to decades or maybe even a century of experience. The replies are intended to answere your questions that have been posted and not to open fire on the person who posts the topic. If you delete your posts then other people will not have the benefit of learning from everyone else.

Opening fire on people is the furthest thing from our minds. I can speak for myself that i answer questions and try with the best of my ability but others are also entitled to put in thier two cents. If someone asks a question about thier herp or insect or what ever be assured that our answers are posted with the best of intensions. Sure everyone is utimately responsible for their own herps but no one here would knowingly give advice that would harm, injur, or kill your herp.

If one makes a post and people see that there is something being done that is incorrect or could potentialy do harm its our duty as fellow herpers to bring it to the owners attention.

So if you post and people are responding take it to grain of salt of you like but heed our advice.

Sorry but I had to post this.

If i missed anything please feel free to post or if you would like to put in your two cents. Please feel free.

[Marla]

Absolutely agreed, Damien. Some of us here are better than others at being very tactful and avoiding offending people. Others are determined to make sure the message gets across if there is something less than optimal about a keeper's husbandry and are less concerned with tact. Then there's the majority of us who fall in the middle, sometimes avoiding responding to a post in order to avoid stirring things up but generally trying to share what we've learned and learn what we can.

So far we don't have any members with a public pattern of personal attacks or staff who encourage infighting, and I think most of us truly want to keep it that way. Basically, that means if you feel that others came down too hard on you or that someone insulted your skills or knowledge or something, chances are still very good that the member(s) involved did it not to put you down, anger you, or embarass you, but to help you take the best care that you can of your critters. You can even feel free to say, "I think you were a little harsh on me," or something like it, and chances are that you'll get a positive response.

Most of us have been involved in forums where things turned ugly at some point and we may have even been a participant or target in that, but we don't want that here. This is a community, and a d@mn good one at that, where we learn from one another and support one another and sometimes tease one another, and every now and again someone's feelings get hurt but that's not what we're about here and if it's out of line the person(s) involved will be told so, usually privately. This isn't aimed at anyone in particular, but if you feel it applies to you, take heart: if you stick around long enough, you will be one of us, and we don't put up wit no shiznit.

I know I'm not always the smoothest talker, but I hope you all know my intentions are good, lol.

Good post Damien. I'm glad we can talk about things like this so as to avoid runing into problems in the future.

[sophie42204]

I have to say, since finally obtaining my long awaited BP, I've checked out other forums and this one, IMHO, has the best people and the most informative, interesting (to say the least), and humorous topics. Since finding this site, I haven't gone back to the others. I love it when we people can come together like this. I truly feel a genuine sense of community here. Thanks, Damien, for reminding us what this is supposed to be all about.

[CTReptileRescue]

very very well written & agreed with
Rusty

[gozetec02]

I just wanted to remind people why we are all here and what we are here to do. Thats all.

[elevatethis]

Another hobby of mine is working on cars, mainly hondas and nissans; among others. I used to frequent a message board for that too, called Honda-Tech.com. I still go there for info when I need it, but don't browse and read posts like I do here. EVERY thread has an arguement in it. Lots of fighting and whatnot, it gets really annoying. I affectionately refer to it as Hater-Tech now.

When I first came here, all I had known was the vibe on HT. I came here and everyone seemed so friendly to the point of being corny. Now this is the board that I spend my time on at work (in between spreadsheets of course *wink*).

Critique on how someone cares for a pet is like walking on ice. Some people take high offense when they are doing something others disagree with.

[lightningtiger09]

This site is definitly one of the best/ most friendly and helpful snake site on the web. We all get into fights sometimes but its always small things that no one says to harm anothers feelings.

[Wizill]

well, there are exceptions but that's what us mod's are here for. you guys won't ever see a thread gone terribly wrong here, we usually lock and/or delete threads heading in the wrong direction. some people just don't know how to act i guess, but other people do. and those people are the ones that sites like this are created for.