A Word from Management...

[Randy Chase]

Recent issues have motivated me to create this thread to attempt to define some things, and provide some perspective. I have been running forums for some years and have a bit of experience here as to what works, and what does not.

Mission Statement
Let me first state what I see as the "mission statement" of LotusTalk is. A community forum that allows members to discuss their Lotus cars and more. A forum to store information and develop solutions. A forum to increase understanding and channel information back to Lotus. A forum to allow community involvement including meets, track days, and more. A forum to allow vendors to reach the userbase and offer solutions.

Public or Private?
Let's start by going over the idea of a "public" forum. It has been suggested that this is a "public" forum. Well, no....It is not. Just about any forum on the internet is not public in that it is not owned by everyone. It might appear public in that membership is open to just about anyone, but that is the limits of it. Forums are more of a benevolent dictatorship.

The forum is actually private and owned by me. What this means is that your participation on the forum and the content are subject to my allowing you and your content to exist here. That can sound a lot more heavy handed than it really is. What it does mean, is that I can limit spammers and porn and anything else I feel does not add to the content of the site, and does not add to the positive experience of the community. I can set rules and enforce them. Agree with me or not, I have to make the final determinations and decisions. The buck stops here.

Lotus Control?
The forum is not under the control of Lotus at all. There have been only a couple of instances where someone at Lotus has asked us to get involved in a thread... such as the April fool's thread a couple years ago that freaked out some people. Or a thread advocating violence against a dealership was removed. That is it. I think a lot of Lotus corporate shakes their collective heads at some of the posts, but they don't ask me to do anything about them. I have never received ANY communication for example about the rear suspension bracing. NONE. ZERO. Nor about any crashes. NONE. ZERO. Nor about the shifter shafts. NONE.


There are many critical posts and threads here about Lotus and the cars. I have no problem with those. By the way...for all the money and time this forum has cost me, Lotus Cars USA gave me a free hat. I don't wear hats.

Censorship vs Moderation
I have some experience running forums, and my stance is that a totally open forum is not a positive experience. "Anything goes" is not how I see LotusTalk. There is no automatic right to free speech here (nor is there anywhere). You can't yell fire in a theater. You can't post offensively here. You can't attack the other forum members because you disagree with them. Nobody should think they have the right to post anything they want.

The way I see my role in this, is to provide guidance as to the development and existence of the community based forum. I provide guidelines and also try to enforce them. To that end, we have a hand picked moderator team that also provides input and helps enforce the rules. In the end, the forum becomes a reflection of all of us as we attempt to define the boundaries.

The basic rules
Personal Attacks. A common thing about online communication is to read into other's posts a perception of being attacked when someone is just disagreeing with you. If the response is to then attack the other person, then the thread turns into a flame war, grudges are made and held and carried over to other threads. Threads become less valuable for research. Other posters become less willing to risk being attacked and will just lurk, post less, or go away. We lose the more valuable members and left only with those that enjoy stirring the flames.

The rule is... NO PERSONAL ATTACKS. That is it. You can debate the message, but don't make it personal. I think the distinction should be pretty clear. And in my opinion, in order to not have someone else perceive they are being attacked, it helps to be careful in how we post. For example, if someone puts a wing on their Lotus... your response could be not typing anything since it would not contribute, to "not sure if I would have done that, but enjoy" to "that looks like crap, WTF were you thinking. Sell the car and buy a Honda." The last sentence begs a responding attack and then requires moderator intervention.

I would also add, when you read... PLEASE DO NOT ASSUME THAT THE OTHER PERSON IS ATTACKING YOU. Often the same thing being said by someone in person across from you, holding a beer, with a smile on his face, would not be taken as an attack. But online, without using smilies, it could be read as one. Don't assume. A real thin skin is a difficult thing when communicating on a forum.

Spamming and "one trick pony" posters. Don't flood the forum with posts about the same thing. Make your point. Agree or disagree, respond to counterpoints... then move on. If you are here to make one point only, and post after post are about that one point, I will probably remove your posts and limit your posting ability. It does not help the community to have thread after thread hijacked about your pet peeve.

Competing forums. It is not cool to come onto LotusTalk and post to drive traffic to another Lotus or Elise forum. All forums want to be successful, but this forum does not exist, nor do I pay for the bandwidth, so that someone else can advertise their site to draw people away from LotusTalk. That is not allowed. If there is specific information on that other Lotus/Elise site, that might make sense. If the information can just as easily be posted in the thread, please do so. Do not just give out a link and ask people to go to your forum.

Duplicate identities. Not allowed. We have had some instances of this. It is not cool for people to pretend to be someone else for any reason. Trust me that I have some tools that allow me to detect this. I can tell if a dealership is posting as a buyer for example.

Offensive posts. There is always those shades of gray, but we all need to keep in mind that not all users have the same tolerance and perspective. My goal is for LotusTalk to be easy to come to without a fear of opening a thread and seeing something that is not cool to see. And a bit of my own personal bias also comes into play. I strongly feel that vidoes or images that are gory have ZERO place on ET. Racism... nope. Nudity? I know it is so hard to find porn or nude images on the internet -sarcasm- ... but I don't want ET to be the place to come to find them. We have all types of members... male and female. Those reading at home and those reading at work. The positives of these kinds of images do not outweigh the potential negatives in my opinion.

Liability issues. Agree or disagree.... it does not matter. As I own the forum, I seek to limit my liability. This means discussions about illegal matters and also threads about your street racing. I am not coming down on this threads from some stance that street racing is wrong. Nope. I just don't want to get sued should someone get hurt. It has happened before.

Commercial Advertising. Most forums do not allow this. We agree with this. Going back over the goals of ET, if it contributes to the community, I am all in favor of it if permission has been given by administration. If you are interested in developing parts for Lotus, please contact "Administrator" for permission to post. Those who develop and sell Lotus products are a positive for the community and should also be supported. On the other hand, there are some limits. Constant posting (see "spam" above) is not adding to the forum and will be dealt with. Slamming a competitor may also require intervention. Key word there is may. Posting about products that have zero Lotus relevance is probably not cool too. Specially if it is about penile enlargement, buying cigarettes in bulk, or how hot females in your area want to hook up. We do not allow spam. If you are interested in advertising on the site including banner ads or putting links in your profile, you must contact sales@autoforums.com to be set up as a supporting vendor. Exceptions to the rule will only be made at the Administrator's discretion.

Violations of these rules can result in the loss of one's posting rights or a complete banning from the forum.

A word about the moderators
Let me also add that many of us contribute to these forums. It is all important, the posts, the experiences, the effort to play well with others. All of it is important. Some of us also do a lot of behinds the scenes work in terms of moderation, server stuff, etc. Many decisions are discussed behinds the scenes by the moderators. We do this because we want to contribute to the community. There is no large salary for this volunteer effort. The work of the moderators should be appreciated. I appreciate it. What I do not want, is to have moderators having to do a lot of work because of one poster. We do not want to spend a lot more time debating the moderation also. We do enough volunteer work as it is. If you are that one poster that causes us a lot more work, your posting rights may be removed.

What we do want. A community of people that enjoy their cars. That seek to help each other. That may want to share experiences. Maybe even have a chuckle or two.

Thanks for reading.

[RacyTracy]

Well, I don't think there are any unreasonable rules there. I can certainly live within them.....Thanks Randy.

[008]

Can i have the hat?

[ulmpharmd]

Totally agree. Thanks for the time you put into this forum. Because, honestly, if it weren't for this forum, i probably would have never gotten an elise to begin with for the simple reason of lack of information on the vehicle. Thanks again to Randy and all who make this forum an informative and relaxing place to read and learn about a car we all love. Aaron

[thillIX]

Randy-

Thanks for all of your hard work! You run a great forum and host a great bunch of people here in your little corner of cyverspace.

Your rules are well thought out and should be acceptable to everyone.

[Patricko]

I was just thinking that it might be a good time for a clarification of the forum rules

[Genjuro]

Great post, thank you!

[Miguel]

To Randy and all the moderators, my hat off to you guys for a job well done.

Well I don't wear hats either but you guys rule! and I do appreciate your hard work.

I hope I never be one that will make you go through extra efforts.



Edit: I would suggest this being a sticky thread.

[andykeck]

Originally Posted by 008

Can i have the hat?

I think the mods should split it.

[ivan1]

about the multiple identities thing - hopefully the medication will kick in soon...until then please bear with us - I mean me
Definitely elise talk has become a less "friendly" place than it used to be which is probably hard to avoid given the increase in members...but I think your rules and guidelines are totally appropriate...

[Serebo1]

Thank you Randy.

[Andrikos]

Right on Randy!
Great rules, I completely agree.

[zOOmz]

Dear Benevolent Dictator,

Your rules suck and so do you.



Love,

zOOmz

[smoseley]

Originally Posted by zOOmz

zOOmz

Can I be a black sheep too? If I'm a follower, am I still technically a black sheep?

[mikester]

Most Excellent !

[eliseowner2b]

Too many rules! I'm selling my car and I want my ET subscription refunded immedately!

But really...this makes good sense...Thanks Randy

[Brian 111]

Timely. Thanks, Randy.

[zOOmz]

Originally Posted by transio

Can I be a black sheep too? If I'm a follower, am I still technically a black sheep?

No, then you are called a troublemaker.

[Crudson]

Spot on. Keep the good work going, we really love this forum.

Originally Posted by Randy Chase

Commercial Advertising. [snip]...or how hot females in your area want to hook up.

I'll take care of any of those messages if you like.

[David]

IMO, you've struck a great balance.