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It is mandatory for members to read the following guidelines before using the NEUROSURGIC forum. Participation in the NEUROSURGIC community and forum constitutes agreement to the following Forum Guidelines, which apply to posts, profile information, profile images, signatures, any other content on this site and participation in general. If you do not wish to be bound by these terms and conditions, you may not access or use the NEUROSURGIC FORUM.
The Forum is moderated by the owners of NEUROSURGIC, Steen Fridriksson, MD, PhD, and Thomas Skoglund, MD, PhD, at least once a week, and additionally by various other forum moderators.
Please note that Forum posts will be visble to all visitors. The exception is the Forum called "Clinical neurosurgery - locked Forum". This Forum is locked and only registered members can access and read it.
When posting a thread in a forum your username will be visible. It will be possible for forum moderators and administrators to modify your posts. When providing medical information please provide references or clearly state when it is your personal experience.
Because of the live nature of the discussions on this forum, it is not possible for the NEUROSURGIC team to review and/or confirm the accuracy or validity of a forum post before it is posted. If you believe that someone has violated our Forum Guidelines or you have spotted content that may otherwise require attention, please send a private message to a member of the NEUROSURGIC team with a link to the content and a brief description of what you believe is wrong. Notification is voluntary and anonymous, but in no case should a member respond to a situation personally, thereby aggravating the situation further. Responding to a violation in an inflammatory manner is a violation in itself and will result in appropriate action.
Any content that violates our Forum Guidelines will be removed. Interpretation of our guidelines is at the discretion of the NEUROSURGIC team.
1. As this is an English-speaking community, we require that posted content be in the English language, so that it can be well received and properly monitored.
2. Cross-posting is not allowed and will result in the removal of one or more posts. Cross-posting is defined as posting the same information in two or more locations. When posting your topic, please try to post it in the most appropriate place within the organizational structure of the Forum. Identical topics posted in the same or different forums will be removed.
3. While member post count has meaning, it should not be taken too seriously. Attempts to artificially increase your post count are prohibited. This includes the mass creation of short or meaningless posts.
4. Advertisements in forum posts are not allowed. Generally speaking, posts made specifically for the promotion of a website, product or service are considered advertising or, at least, posts made that unnecessarily send people to a website that you are in some way affiliated with. It does not matter if it is a commercial website, a personal website, a non profit website, etc.
All signature links must be kept in your signature in your profile. Anyone found to be posting excessive links to their websites or suspected of using "sneaky" advertising methods is in violation of this guideline. You may only post a link to your site/a site that you are in some way affiliated with if the link specifically answers the question that is being asked and the answer cannot be simply posted without the link. Even then, link directly to the page where the information can be found. General and unnecessary links will be tagged as advertising. If you are found to be excessively posting links to your site (or you appear to be seeking out threads where your link may be relevant, so that you can post it), you may lose the ability to post links to your site.
5. You are not allowed to post an affiliate URL that leads to you earning cash, banner impressions, credits, points, etc. Such links are only allowed in signatures and profiles, but may not be referred to in posts.
6. Do not post personal, real-life information such as home addresses and home phone numbers.
7. Vulgar language and inappropriate material is not allowed and will be removed. Abbreviations, self censoring, and attempts to circumvent the word censoring feature of the forum software also violate this guideline. If your post contains a word that is censored by the software, you must remove that word or the post will be removed. If you feel that the censor is acting in error, please contact us.
8. When linking to outside websites, you must ensure that the content of the link is appropriate for our community, in line with the guidelines laid out here. This includes mentioning or referencing a site, even if the mention is not hyperlinked. If you post a link and that link is automatically censored, it is considered to be an inappropriate link and you should remove it from your post immediately. If left, all posts that feature inappropriate links will be removed.
9. Posts that discuss illegal activities, transactions, or websites such as warez, cracks, etc. will be removed. This includes the posting of information that you have obtained illegally.
10. Political and religious discussions are not allowed on this website. If it is believed that the end result of a discussion will be political or religious, the post may be removed. Likewise, strong political and religious expressions or sentiments should be kept out of profiles, signatures, and other content.
11. Do not post copyrighted materials (articles, videos, audio, etc.) that you do not have permission to reproduce or distribute. For text articles, most of the time you may quote abstracts or a small portion of the article (usually no more than 1/5 or 1/6) and you must link to the source (if online) or provide the source (if offline). Posting the entire article, even with the source, constitutes copyright infringement.
12. When posting and linking to images, videos, files, etc., please refrain from hotlinking. This is the direct linking to images (.jpg, .jpeg, .gif, .png, etc.), video (.avi, .mov, .mpg, .mpeg, .wmv, etc.), audio (.mp3, .wav, etc.), archives (.zip, .rar, etc.) or otherwise downloadable or streamable files, on servers that you do not have permission to link to, instead of linking to the page where the item can be found. This includes providing a direct link to the file, even if that file is not embedded into your post. This practice costs the server owner money and resources.
13. Respect is the name of the game. You must respect your fellow members. Please refrain from inflammatory and defamatory comments as well as flaming, taunting, and general disrespect. Do not simply put down the opinion or advice given by others. If you don't agree with it, say why - respectfully. Don't just tell them they're wrong. Do not make uninvited remarks about typos, duplicate posts, posting styles, etc.
14. Signatures are limited to three lines of text and this includes blank lines. No images are allowed in the signature. The text in the signature may be customized by the BBCode in use on the forums. It is recommended that you stick with readable fonts and colors and that the size is not too large. You may mention websites and ventures that you are in some way related to, as long as they are otherwise appropriate for this community. Focus on things that you like, not things that you don't.
15. If you would like to change your username, please contact us and, most likely, we can do it for you while you can keep all of your profile data, posts, and other content.
16. Automated account creation, participation, and content scraping is not permitted.
17. All member submitted content in this forum is granted to us with perpetual electronic publishing rights because any content posted here becomes a part of the forum, even if you no longer are a part of the community. You may request an item to be removed at any time, but we will decide when and if to remove content from our forum. If you wish to no longer be identified with our community, we will be glad to close your account and alter your profile information to remove all identifying characteristics. After account closure, you will no longer be able to participate in this community and this action is not reversible.
18. Administrators and moderators have the final say on anything here on the forum. If you have a problem, you may make a complaint to them directly and not publicly on the website. Creating threads or posts that question or reference administrative decisions or potential administrative decisions, such as post removals and thread closures, is not permitted. If you feel that a mistake has been made, please privately contact a team member and we will review the situation. If you would like a copy of your removed post so that you can adjust it and repost, please contact us. As long as we wouldn't prefer you to simply start over, we'll be glad to send you a copy.
19. Whenever you are participating in this community, please keep in mind that we strive to create a friendly and inviting atmosphere. So, please have fun and enjoy the forums!
Freedom of speech rights do not extend to privately owned websites, such as this one. These guidelines detail the types of behavior and activities that are allowed here.
If a member violates our guidelines and shows a disregard for them, our team and our community, they run the risk of losing their account. We reserve the right to deactivate any account and to edit or remove any content without warning. These guidelines are subject to change at any time without notice.
Do you have a question about our Forum Guidelines or anything else? Do you have a suggestion? Do you want to offer some feedback? Or are you experiencing some trouble with the site? Well, no matter what it is, please do not hesitate to contact us and we will be glad to help in any way that we can.
Thank you for visiting NEUROSURGIC. We are glad to have you with us on our forum and community.
Updated February 21, 2010 |
