05-13-2008, 06:27 PM
Universal Rules
These rules are general rules that should be upheld in all areas of the forum, rather than just specific areas. These are the most important to know.
By posting in or opening a thread on these forums, you acknowledge these rules and guidelines and agree to follow them.
1. Don't be dumb.
No pointless or stupid comments. Do your best to type in complete sentences and with correct spelling and grammar, don't spam or advertise, etc. Yes, this includes another person's topic and/or rep points.
- 1.1: Make sure your post has actual content in it.
Single-word posts, short sentence posts, blankposting, and/or quoting a previous post with no additional content added by yourself are generally frowned upon. Don't just post to say "XD" or "lol". Doing this counts as spamming, which will result in a 30% warn and posting rights being revoked for 12 hours. Therefore, put something of at least of SOME additional value to the current topic into your post that people might actually read, and not just scroll past.
- 1.2: Don't derail other people's topics.
Unless you have something interesting to add to the topic, don't post in it at all. Posting your sprites in someone else's topic isn't interesting. If you want attention so badly then make your own topic.
- 1.3: Speaking of topics...
You're encouraged to use one collective thread for all your submissions to one section. If you only make a few rips once in a while, seperate threads are fine, but if you have many submissions, please post them in one single thread. So if you plan to submit many rips from many Console-X games, create a single topic in the Console-X section for all of them - If you have many submissions for games of various consoles, a single thread in the general submission subforum would be nice. Of course, sprites, models, sounds and textures should still each have their own threads in the appropriate sections!
We won't bite you for making small threads, but we may merge them and poke you into the right direction if we notice an influx! It helps the uploaders to keep an overview about the submission situation.
- 1.4: Don't overuse alternate fonts and emotes
We have these nice features and there's nothing wrong with using them. However, overusing them isn't advised. Making all your posts in a non-standard font or colour should be avoided. The usage of these should be restriced to cases where they make sense, for example to mark or emphasize text sections or to give large texts or story parts better structuring.
There's also nothing wrong with using emoticons, but you shouldn't put a ton of random ones everywhere. There's no need to put long chains of emoticons at the end of every post or sentence.
2. Be friendly.
Don't just randomly flame other members and be mean for no real reason. Randomly accusing members of sprite theft and the like without evidence or a VERY good reason to do so is against the rules.
- 2.1: This goes for Reputation, also.
One of our board features is a system where you can give positive or negative feedback to members, along with comments about said feedback. This is still a part of the board system, so upholding politeness is also important here. If we find any unfair, aggressive, or unwarranted reputation changes (especially negative ones), the poster of that message will be warned for flaming.
- 2.2: No flamebaiting/calling out, either.
I've noticed a rising trend of community members directly and indirectly calling out other members in completely unrelated threads. It is very rude and its only intention is to start trouble. If you're going to do this, don't be surprised when you end up warned for it.
- 2.3: Respect other's work.
Since this board is heavily art-oriented, people will make sprites, music, writing or anything related to art. The board gives you the rights to comment and give criticism on it, but if you act like an ass toward the artist without helping at all, measures will be taken. We aren't saying to sugarcoat your criticism, but being downright insulting doesn't work either.
3. Respect the staff team.
This doesn't mean that you can't disagree with us or criticize us for our work, but don't think that just because we aren't regular members we don't have bad days occasionally, just like everyone else.
- 3.1: Don't cry when getting warns.
"the h idion fucker do u waan die tonite. punk ho deservedd dti lbeumoeutrmphg baoo hoo he said something MEAON BETTER BAN THE MEANDIE3...........SHIHITT DHEAH" or "WARN ME HARDER WARN ME HARDER OH GOD YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS" aren't intelligent things to say after you were warned. If you were warned, chances are you really deserved it. Complaining why you got the warn, and/or sending threatening PMs to the mod responsible for the action will result in severe measures. If you really feel the punishment wasn't well-placed, contact the mod and please CALMLY say why you think you don't deserve the warning.
- 3.2: The staff team also need to respect the rules, too.
Just because we've got colored names, it doesn't mean those rules don't affect us. If you see a mod doing something abusive and/or wrong, contact another mod to take care of it. If you disagree with moderator actions, forum rules or how things are managed in general, you may criticise us. However, derailing topics, making sarcastic or rude comments is not acceptable. You can contact members of staff with your complaints or, if you prefer public discussion, make a topic at Site Discussion. Again, just as with rule 3.1, stay calm, be respectful and serious. Sarcastic remarks and defiant spam will have serious consequences. If you want to be taken serious, mind your manners.
- 3.3: The Spriter's Resource is not a democracy.
Forums are like HOA communities, not democracies; you can stay here and have a fun time but if you break certain rules the people in charge can (and will) ban you at their discretion. And, like HOA communities, the rules are enforced not because we're a police state or some grumpy dictatorship (that wouldn't be a very long-lived forum!) but because we want everyone to have a good experience.
If you break the rules enough times you will be banned. You don't have to come back, access to tSR isn't some sort of human right and "getting revenge" surely won't help your cause.
That said, this doesn't mean that you can't disagree with us or criticize us for our work.
4. Stay safe for work.
Don't post any porn or illegal material. This includes linking to ROMs and the sites that host them. Discussion about ROMs and emulators is fine in reference to how to use them to rip the resources we archive on these sites but any links to or instructions for obtaining ROMs is strictly forbidden.
- 4.1: This applies to all tSR forums.
tSR has a lot of places you can personalize, such as avatars, signatures, reputations, biography and others. Do not forget that THEY ARE PART OF tSR so if any offensive material is found in any of those places, the person responsible for it will be punished.
5. No excessive use of memes or fads.
If it's on the internet, we've probably already heard or seen it. Please don't think you're original for posting "shoop da whoop" or talking about "long cat" - you can use 4chan for that.
- 5.1: Speaking of excessive things, excessive swearing isn't a good idea either.
There are no hard and fast rules about swearing (it is allowed, so there's no real need to self-censor); but if you start aiming those offensive words at another member; or just throw them out anywhere for no great reason; expect to be dealt with harshly. Hate speech is especially discouraged. Keep that kind of thing on the *Chans.
6. Don't just request for things.
If there is anything that Tony the Tiger ever taught me, it's that you have to earn your stripes. Nobody will respect you if you join the community just to request something and then disappear forever. Because of this, you're required to make 20 posts before you're allowed to request anything. This gives you time to integrate yourself into the community and learn to post here. You can try to request in the Requests forum, but there's no guarantee that the request will be fulfilled to the quality that you want or even at all. Make sure to read the rules of requesting VERY CAREFULLY if you wish to request.
- 6.1: Good things come to those who wait.
Do not post a request thread anywhere but in the Requests forum. If you are unable to post there, it's probably because you don't meet the requirements to do so. Just take some time to get to know us, relax yourself into the community and soon enough, you'll be able to make a request. If you post a request thread of any sort outside the Requests forum without meeting the requirements, it will be locked on sight and the poster will be warned, so don't get hasty now.
- 6.2: Don't be a slavedriver.
If someone kindly fulfills a request of yours, do not try to manipulate them into doing more things for you. This is a terrible act and if you do such a thing you will be punished. A prime example of such an event can be seen in this thread. Remember, "gimme gimme never gets". If you want more things that badly, then don't be lazy and try your best to learn how to obtain such a thing on your own. If you can't, then try asking about it on the forum (making sure you've searched the internet first of course). You may just find you don't need anyone to do it for you.
- 6.3: Don't just drop in to ask for stuff either.
I've noticed that some new members like to just barge into other people's submission topics and ask for things. If you do this without meeting the requirements you will be warned. Instead, send a PM to the OP explaining what you want (or preferably ask them how you can obtain it yourself), and patiently wait for them to respond. If they don't reply in a few/several days then request/ask about it in a new thread (again, no requesting if you don't meet the requirements). Don't harass them about it either, or there will be consequences if we find out. Remember, people generally have lives outside the internet too. The only exception to this is if the OP specifically states that they're taking requests. In which case, it is fine, as long as you don't go overboard and become pushy -- just respect that they're taking their own time to rip something for you and accept it if they say they cannot do it or decide not to.
- Note:
The requirements to make a request have changed. You must now have been registered for at least a month in addition to the previous 20 quality posts requirement. This change was made to stop people from just spamming their way to 20 posts, which is a rather common problem right now.
7. No e-kleptomania, please.
Trying to submit stolen work to tSR is a pretty big deal (and will have some pretty big consequences when we find out), but posting media that isn't yours in the Sprite Projects, Sprite Discussion, and/or Creative boards - and all Sub-boards included - pretty much counts as stealing. If someone wants their work posted here, they should do so themselves.
8. Don't bump old threads or double post.
Don't necropost. In other words, don't bump an old thread that is dead, which generally means anything not on the first page of topics. Of course, if it's something like your own topic and you're showing some changes to your old work or something, then go ahead. On that note, it's fine to double post if you're bumping your own thread because you've made a noteworthy change to your work or have something else valuable to add; just don't bump your thread if it's simply to say "bumping because it's not the first topic in the list" or something stupid like that. Also, please don't bump your topic in quick succession - if the last couple of posts are all yours, please wait rather than bumping for tiny changes. If you do want to bump a dying topic, please do, but make sure it's at least reaching the end of the page of topics first.
- 8.1: PLEASE TRY TO PAY ATTENTION TO POST DATES.
If a submission thread is a month or more old, then don't post in it just to say "wow nice job!!!!1111" or something similar with no useful content. If you would like to ask a question concerning the OP's work, then please PM them and not bump their topic. There are a few exceptions to this however such as some Gaming Discussion threads (videogames you love/hate, what are you playing, etc.) Real Life threads, stickied threads, etc., as long as your post is actually adding something of interest to the topic.
9. Let's have page loading efficiency!
Being a board heavily related to digital art, there are going to be a whole lot of images posted. Some of these images are going to be very large. However, if the images are too large horizontally, the forum boundaries will have to stretch to accommodate - which can cause issues on a few computers and slow net connections. If an image is really that large, link to it instead (all image hosting services offer direct links as well as the image insertion code). Same with threads containing a lot of videos, such as this one and this one; put them in spoiler tags so it doesn't slow down the browsing. We're not heartless enough to warn you for things like that, but we'll convert very large images and videos to links/spoiler tags if necessary.
- 9.1: Signatures
This generally goes without saying, but a large signature can cause the same problems as a large image in a post. Because your sig shows up in every post you make, it can get annoying pretty quickly. Having incredibly huge sigs - in file size or dimensions - is incredibly unnecessary. They will be deleted. If it persists, a warn or suspension will follow.
- 9.2: Quoting images
Quoting videos and images, especially the big ones, also affects browsing performance while making the forum look like a mess. Use your common sense when quoting images and videos and edit them into links if you feel it's appropriate to do so.
10. Reporting System
The reporting system is there to report posts that are offensive, out of order, or just plain wrong. Don't report something like "he locked my topic" when you know good and well there was a good reason for a lock. The mods have to take time to check the reports and want to spend that time making the forum a better place rather than seeing stupid reports. So yeah, don't abuse the reporting system, especially over and over again. Thanks.
11. Bandodging
Were you banned? Good. Chances are you probably deserved it. If you attempt to make an alternate account in order to get around your ban (also called bandodging) you will be re-banned (on both accounts) and additional time will be added to your original ban. If you were permanently banned, well, you're still permanently banned. If you continue to bandodge, you WILL be IP banned. Because of this, coming here through a proxy isn't the best idea. Though proxy use isn't disallowed, we do have a couple of banned members who have tried to get past an IP ban using proxies, so the proxy that you're using will probably end up becoming banned. You'll either have to find a new proxy or just come here through your normal IP address.
- 11.1: Speaking of banned members...
You are not to post anything for a banned member. They were banned for a reason and if you do any such thing for them you will be harshly punished.
- 11.2: Speaking of alternate accounts...
Even if your account is not banned, it is discouraged that you create an alternate account. If you cannot access your original account for whatever reason, you should contact staff in order to get help. If you think you have a valid reason to create an alternate account, discuss it with staff first.
Secondary Rules
To keep things tidy and in one place, other sections' rules will also be posted here. Dividing the rules across several sections proved difficult to the newcomers, so while this might make things a little long, all the rules can be checked in one place.
NOTE: The rules listed below may be slightly outdated because they're crossposted from the actual rule thread in the corresponding section. We do our best to keep the rules updated in all places, but sometimes inaccuracies may happen. It is advisable to read the rules in the actual forum thread.
If accuracies do exist, the valid version is the one posted in the actual forum thread.
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Spriting & Pixelart RulesIf you break the rules, we will make a judgement on what you will receive as a punishment which will be decided by either the administration team or the moderation team. Spamming, Flaming, and Stealing have set warning levels and effects on posting rights, but there are exceptions.
Remember: The admins and staff can pretty much do what they want, and reserve the right to change these rules at any time.
