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Japers’ Rink Community Guidelines

Welcome to Japers’ Rink, a community of and for Washington Capitals fans. We don’t have many rules around here, but those that we do have, we enforce – we’re all for hard-hitting discussion, but let’s keep the elbows down and have some fun, shall we?

Free Speech at Japers’ Rink

Japers’ Rink believes strongly in having a vibrant community that respectfully discusses ideas, opinions and events no matter the viewpoint. Users are, in general, free to express their opinions without fear of retribution. The diversity of personalities, beliefs, and styles is appreciated as being part of what makes The Rink strong.

However, Japers’ Rink is a community, and free speech does not mean “the right to say what you want, when you want, how you want,” without being sensitive to, and respectful towards, the community as a whole. In a community, speech is not “free” – it comes with responsibility.

The following are simply not acceptable on Japers’ Rink (excepting, in some cases, for obvious humor between people with an existing rapport); they violate Japers’ Rink’s Community Guidelines, and are subject to sanction as outlined below:

In addition to those specific types of offenses enumerated above, it cannot be emphasized strongly enough that Japers’ Rink is a community designed to encourage the sharing of thoughts, opinions, questions and, above all, meaningful discussion. What this means is that readers should ask themselves prior to posting a comment, “Is this going to add something to the specific discussion at hand?” If the answer is no, the comment shouldn’t be posted – comments which may deter from these discussions (or commenting for commenting’s sake) can potentially discourage those who read the site for the analysis and opinion from participating, and so on. We do have off-topic posts to recognize and promote the more social aspects of this community and reasonable digressions, and encourage community members to make use of these. While posting off-topic comments may not seem to be as problematic as the ten types of unacceptable comments detailed above, they can actually do more systemic harm to the community and will not be tolerated.

Finally, it’s a requirement that every member have a current email address in his or her SBNation member profile (the email address does not need to be public) and that members respond to emails from moderators and editors.  We try to resolve as many disputes as possible informally, but we can only do that if we can communicate with our members.  We are far less likely to give the benefit of the doubt to a member has a fake email address in a profile or fails to respond to our emails.

Consequences for Violating the Japers’ Rink Community Guidelines

Violations of Japers’ Rink Community Guidelines will be handled on a case-by-case basis, but, in general, violators can expect one warning followed by a banning for any subsequent violations. Banned users can apply for reinstatement at any point, but the onus will be on the user to explain why s/he should be allowed back into the community.

FanPosts and FanShots

See “FanPosts and FanShots: A User Guide” for the “how to” of this area of community participation, but here are some additional guidelines for posting FanPosts and FanShots:

  • A FanPost must in some way belong on Japers’ Rink – in other words, it must relate to the Capitals or to hockey or to Japers’ Rink or to an existing thread, etc.
  • It is not permitted to use FanPosts, FanShots, or comments for advertising (to include a user linking to his or her own content elsewhere on the Internet). Anything posted in a FanPost, FanShot, or comments that contains commercial advertising is subject to deletion without notice.
  • We reserve the right to delete any FanPost or FanShot for any reason, and are likely to do so in the following instances:
    • A FanPost or FanShot that contains any of the above enumerated list of Community Guideline violations.
    • A FanPost or FanShot that has not received any comments within 24 hours of posting is likely not of sufficient widespread interest to be taking up space on the site (of course, we’re likely to be more lenient during holidays, weekends, etc.).
    • A FanPost or FanShot that is the subject or part of the subject of a post that one of the site’s writers is soon to publish or has published may be deleted so as not to have redundant content on the site (it is extremely rare that a FanPost will be deleted for this reason, but a FanShot that contains a link that is going to be part of the upcoming Caps Clips post, for example, may fall prey to such a deletion).
    • A FanPost or FanShot that is incorrectly formatted will likely be deleted – make sure to read “FanPosts and FanShots: A User Guide.”

Disclaimer: These guidelines are intended to help you understand the policies, procedures, and processes generally used by Japers’ Rink. While you are using Japers’ Rink, which is a part of SB Nation, you are also subject to the SB Nation Terms of Use. Also, please take note of the SB Nation Privacy Policy, to which this site subscribes. Both of the above links are also available at the bottom of Japers’ Rink’s front page. Finally, it is entirely at our discretion as to how to interpret and implement these guidelines, which are subject to change at any time without notice.

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