PLEASE READ CAREFULLY

In order to facilitate the free and respectful exchange of opinions about all things Mac, the following board etiquette should be observed. If you ever have a question about why a post was removed, please consult this list. This board is monitored by a team of unpaid administrators. This team is responsible for keeping this message board fun, informative and clean. We expressly reserve the right to deny authorization to any person at any time, for any reason, as well as to delete in its entirety any post or link to material which we, in our sole discretion, deem to be offensive to the sensibilities of ordinary persons, or which might subject us to legal liability.

These Guidelines apply only to The Ledge. We cannot monitor or be responsible for discussions in emails, on other message boards, newsgroups or mailing lists.

In general, you are expected to respect your fellow Ledgies. Lively heated discussion is encouraged, but please use common sense, good judgment, and treat others as you would like to be treated. Not everyone is going to agree, but if that's the case, just agree to disagree and leave it at that. If you have a valid argument in support of your view, please contribute. If all you have to add are harrassing, insulting, taunting, nasty remarks or name-calling, you'll be asked to go somewhere else. Taunting is defined as "aggravation by deriding, mocking, criticizing or carping". If someone has annoyed you to total distraction, but has not been abusive, it is suggested that you use the “Ignore List” feature for those people whose messages you wish not to read. By adding someone to your ignore list, messages posted by these individuals will be hidden when you read a thread.

Now, What's Cool to Post?

• Feel free to post anything that relates to the topic at hand. If it doesn't pertain to the specific topic, try to find a forum where it might and start your own thread.
• If you are in disagreement remember you are attacking people's viewpoints and opinions, not the people themselves. Don't let the discussions get personal.

What's Not Cool:

• Contents of emails, posts from other message boards, newsgroups or mailing lists authored by anyone other than yourself. Personal feuds will not be tolerated.
• Any statement that defames, abuses or threatens others
• Derogatory statements that could be construed as bigoted, hateful or racially offensive or comments defaming sexual orientation
• Material that advocates illegal activity or discusses illegal activities with the intent to commit them. This includes any threats including death or bodily harm
• Photos or addresses of a band member’s residence and/or photos of their automobiles are not permitted. This would apply to any “friends of the band” also.
• Messages that are simply quotes of other messages without any additional comments
• Unauthorized copyrighted material
• Material that contains vulgar, obscene or indecent language
• Sexually explicit language, images or other content (pornography). Obscene language and/or graphics are not acceptable. No pornography or photos depicting explicit nudity (this includes, but is not limited to, photos that show full frontal or rear nudity).
• No Attacks / Retaliation of any kind. Either against a member or group of members. Doing so will result in a warning. If you continue, you WILL be banned. This is a situation in which the argument, “He/She started it,” won’t be considered a valid excuse.
• Advertising or any form of commercial solicitation for sale products, services or other websites
• Repeated messages a.k.a. Spam. This also means no repetitive posting to increase your post count. Also, please do not post the same subject on more than one forum board; cross-posts will be removed
• Fan Fiction. (There are other sites and mailing lists where this is enjoyed)
• Posing and Shilling. Always post under your own username: do not share logins with other users. Do not pose as another user with a screen name well-known to the group. Do not register multiple screen names in order to post under different identities (shilling). Do not register for banned users. Misuse of logins may result in removal of posts and board access
• No trolling. A troll is a person who enters an established forum and intentionally tries to cause disruption, most often in the form of posting inflammatory, off-topic, or otherwise inappropriate messages
• Posts in specific forums should stay on topic. If you want to talk about something else, please take it to the correct forum
• No Avatar & Signature Abuse. These are a luxury and abuse of them will result in them being disabled for you
• Other Online Etiquette to keep in mind: Posting in all CAPITAL LETTERS is most often considered shouting, so keep it to a minimum please. The Ledge Management and Moderators reserve the right to ban users, remove individual posts or revoke posting privileges of users who violate these guidelines. For more about “netiquette”, see http://www.albion.com/netiquette/corerules.html

How Do I Report An Offense?

Although the Moderators survey the message boards regularly, they do not read every single post. You can help monitor your community by alerting a Moderator if you see threatening, offensive or spam messages on the boards. If you take offense to a particular post, or feel it is inappropriate in any way based on our established Guidelines, use the "Bad Post" link that is in the upper right hand corner of every post. It will then be decided what action should be taken, if any.

While the Moderators will definitely review any messages brought to their attention, it will be their decision whether to remove or edit the message, or, ultimately, revoke posting privileges. Keep in mind that The Penguin reserves the right to edit or remove any posts or the posting privileges of users who continually abuse the boards. You can spout the First Amendment, Free Speech rhetoric all you'd like, but once you hit that "Submit" button, your message becomes the intellectual property of The Penguin. Period, 'nuff said, end of story.

Three Strikes, You're Out!

As a general rule, The Ledge will operate on a three-strike policy, similar to baseball and California. The first two times a user violates any of our established guidelines they will be warned via e-mail, on The Ledge, or both. Each strike will be accompanied by a minimum 48-hour temporary ban. If the problem persists beyond the second warning we will remove their access to The Ledge. However, no one is promised "three strikes." Not all violations are equal. Sometimes outrageous and egregious conduct is involved, warranting the strictest response. The moderators will review infractions on a case by case basis. The Ledge reserves the right to ban members permanently and immediately, without any prior disciplinary warnings or action at all. Simple enough.

SOME POSTING POINTERS

Each Forum has a Moderator who is responsible for fielding any complaints concerning posts in that individual forum. If necessary, Forum moderators may contact posters privately through e-mail, possibly remove offensive posts and, in very rare and extreme circumstances, with the permission of the Ledge owners, suspend or ban posting privileges temporarily or permanently. There is a link on the main screen to the list of Forum Leaders, along with contact information.

In general, the main "rule" for posting on The Ledge is the Golden rule--"do unto others..." An attitude of respect toward each other and the members of Fleetwood Mac should be maintained always.

Each Forum has a focus. Essentially, while posting in that Forum, you are in an "audience" of very devoted fans of that person, or group of people. Discussing a band member's personal life in a judgmental way usually only engenders negative emotions and harbors bad feelings. While this is a public board, and such discussion is not "banned," respect for others should also include a respect for ALL of the members of Fleetwood Mac, past and present. As you would probably not like parts of your personal life publicized on the World Wide Web, we recommend you extend this courtesy to the members of Fleetwood Mac in your speculations about theirs. As the FM subjects are segregated, if you basically detest one member of the band, it's quite easy to avoid those forums that worship the same member. If conflicts begin to arise, it's probably best that you do.

• If you post something you feel is potentially controversial, or if you are responding to a potentially controversial post, it is your responsibility to keep the focus on the subject at hand. Don’t let your arguments get personal. Any disagreements, past or present, should be dealt with privately, not on The Ledge.
• We know the sense of community that has developed on The Ledge is why many of you make your home here. We respect and cherish that. However, sometimes the personal banter, inside jokes and teasing are daunting for occasional visitors who are only here to learn more about Fleetwood Mac, not to socialize. Therefore, if board exchanges because too personal and exclusive, they should move to PM or to Chit Chat. Comments should be general enough for "the whole class to enjoy." If only a couple of readers will understand or appreciate the posts, then they should be exchanged privately.
• In expressing your devotion to one member of Fleetwood Mac, please try to avoid belittling the accomplishments of the others.
• Since people of all ages post on the Ledge, we would remind you to avoid sexually explicit posts and the use of profanity.
• As there is more chance for misinterpretation in the written word, if you are unsure whether your sense of humor will be interpreted in the spirit intended, there are a number of emoticons that can help clarify your meaning.
• If you are a senior member, it would be appreciated if you would lead by example and help (rather than attack or encourage) other, newer members who may not be following the the proper etiquette.
• If you have nothing to add to a post, a one word comment can usually be misinterpreted and probably should be avoided. If you have something to say, say it. If not, let it go. Additionally make sure when replying that your post actually contains original content rather than just agreeing with another post. 'Me too' or LOL posts (with nothing else added) are annoying, time and space-consuming, and considered bad netiquette.

In addition, there are some technical points that might improve the "readability" of the Ledge:

• Use short subject lines and place your message inside the body of your post.
• Don't use all caps. Message or subject lines with all caps are difficult to read.
• Use (nt) in your subject line. If your post has no text other than the subject line, please let everyone know with an (nt).
• Off topic posts should have OT in the subject line whenever possible.
• Do not abuse the "Delete Post" option. We all need to delete our posts occasionally, but deleted posts tend to clutter the thread stream. Don't make temporary posts with the intention of removing them later. Deletions should be used in exceptional circumstances and should not become part of your regular posting pattern. If we see a chronic deleter, we may disable that poster's ability to delete his or her own posts.
• Please communicate with The Penguin and/or the Forum Moderators by private e-mail and not by posting a message on The Ledge.

Posting on The Ledge should be fun and relatively stress free if we all treat each other the way we would want to be treated. You are encouraged to be tolerant of differences in the ways that people express themselves.

Based on past experience, these guidelines and posting suggestions have been deemed the most important by the majority of Ledge posters and support the high standards this site strives to maintain. Everyone may not agree with them, but it is virtually impossible to please everybody. There is rarely any reason to interfere with messages and we do not anticipate that that will change. We will, however, not tolerate posts that bait and attack.

The board administrator and moderators cannot be held responsible for anything posted in the Ledge forums. Because participation on the Ledge is purely voluntary and can be discontinued at any time, threats to sue the board administrator and/or moderators because of words exchanged in a personal disagreement with another Ledge poster are baseless and frivolous and will subject the person issuing the 'threat' to immediate banning - 3 strikes you're out. Moderators can and will only take action on those posts that occur on the Ledge that violate the guidelines explained here.

Do not use the Ledge's private messaging system to harass or threaten others. If the administrator or moderators receive complaints, private messaging capabilities will be taken away from anyone violating this guideline.

Contributions can be conveniently and securely be made via Paypal in the Paid Subscription section of your User CP. Subscriptions can be purchased for either $6 for 6 months or $12 for 12 months. That only a dollar per month -- less than a cup of Starbucks coffee!

You can search for posts based on username, word(s) in the post or just in the subject, by date, and only in particular forums.

To access the search feature, click on the "search" link at the top of most pages.

You can search any forum that you have permission to search - you will not be allowed to search through private forums unless the administrator has given you the necessary security rights to do so.

Yes! To send an email to another member, you can either locate the member you want to contact on the member list, or click the button on any post made by that member.

This will usually open a page that contains a form where you can enter your message. When you have finished typing your message, press the [send email] button and your message will be sent instantly. Note that for privacy reasons, the email address of the recipient is not revealed to you during this process.

Note that if you can not find an email button or link for a member, it either means that the administrator has disabled email functions for this forum, or that the member in question has specified that they do not wish to receive email from other members of the forum.

Another useful email function is the ability to send a friend a link to a thread you think they may find interesting. Whenever you view a thread, you will find a link somewhere on the page which will allow you to send a brief message to anyone you like. Your referrerid is added to the link you send, so if your friend registers on this forum as a result of viewing the link you sent to them, your referrals total will automatically be credited!

Registered members may also be able to send messages to other members of this forum using the private messaging system. For more information about private messaging, click here.

If the administrator has enabled the Private Messaging system, registered members may send each other private messages.

Sending Private Messages

Private messages work a little like email, but are limited to registered members of this forum. You may be able to include vB Code, smilies and images in private messages that you send.

You may send a private message to a member of this forum by clicking the 'Send A Private Message' link in the private messaging section of your user control panel, or by clicking the button in a member's posts.

When you send a message, you have the option to save a copy of the message in your Sent Items folder.

Private Message Folders

By default, you will have two folders in your private message area. These are the Inbox and the Sent Items folders.

The Inbox folder contains any new messages you receive, and allows you to view all the messages you have received, along with the name of the person who sent the message to you, and the date and time the message was sent.

The Sent Items folder contains a copy of any messages that you have sent, where you have specified that you wish to keep a copy of the message for future reference.

You may create additional folders for your messages by clicking the 'Edit Folders' link.

Each folder has a set of message controls which allow you to select messages, then either move them to one of your custom folders, or delete them completely. You may also have a button which allows you to forward multiple messages from a folder to another member of the forum.

You will need to periodically delete old messages, as the administrator has probably set a limit to the number of private messages you can have in your folders. If you exceed the number of messages specified by the administrator, you will not be able to send or receive new messages until you delete some old messages.

Whenever you read a message, you will have the option to reply to the message, or forward that message to another member of the forum. You may also have the ability to forward that message to multiple members of your buddy list.

Message Tracking

When you send a new private message, you may have the option to request a read-receipt for that message. This will allow you to check whether or not a message has been read by its recipient by viewing the Private Message Tracking page.

This page is divided into two sections: unread messages and read messages.

The unread messages section shows all messages that you have sent with a read-receipt request, that have not yet been read by their recipient.

The read messages section shows all messages you have sent with a receipt request that have been read and acknowledged by their recipient. The time that the message was read is also shown.

You may choose to end the tracking on any message you choose by selecting the message and clicking the [end tracking] button.

When you receive a message with a read-receipt request, you may have the option to read the message while denying the read-receipt request. To do this, simply click the 'deny receipt' link rather than the title of the message, if it appears.

The member list contains a complete list of all the registered members of this forum. You can view the member list ordered alphabetically by username, by the date that the member joined the forum, or by the number of posts the members have made.

The member list also has a search function, which allows you to quickly locate members according to categories you specify, such as searching for all members who have joined in the past week etc.

The calendar functions in a way similar to the forums in that there can be multiple calendars. One calendar could hold just events that you are able to see, while another may list birthdays.

There are two types of events on the calendar: normal events and recurring events.

Normal Events span the time frame from when the event starts until the event ends.

Recurring Events repeat over a set period of time based on certain criteria. Examples would be an event that occurs on the first Monday of every month and an event that occurs every Monday and Wednesday.

The administrator may have enabled registered members to post events, but usually this is not the case. You can most likely post your own private events that are only viewable to you.

Birthdays may be shown on the calendar if the administrator has enabled this feature. Your birthday will automatically be shown on the calendar if you have entered the date of your birthday in your profile. Note: if you do not enter the year of your birth when you edit your profile, your age will not be shown on the calendar.

If you enter your birthday, your name will also appear on the main forum page when it is your birthday.

Announcements are special messages posted by the administrator or moderators. They are designed to be a simple one-way communication with the users. If you wish to discuss announcements, you will have to create a new thread in the forum, since you cannot reply to announcements.

You may find a small menu on thread pages which allows you to 'rate this thread' with a number between 1-5.

Casting a vote for threads you view is entirely optional, but if you think that the thread is superb, you might rate it as a 5-star thread, or if you think that it's unspeakably dismal, you might choose to rate the thread with a single star.

Once enough votes have been cast for the thread rating, you may see a set of stars appear with the title of the thread in the thread listings. These stars reflect the average vote cast, and can allow you to quickly see which threads are worth reading if you are on a very busy forum with a lot of threads.

The administrator may have enabled referrals, which allows you to be credited for any new users you invite to the forum.

You gain referrals by promoting The Ledge using your unique referral link. The link you should use as your referral link is this:

http://ledge.fleetwoodmac.net/index.php?referrerid=0

Each time someone follows this link to The Ledge and registers as a new member, your referral count will be incremented by one. The number of referrals you have can be viewed in your profile.

Your administrator will have more information on any prizes or rewards that may be given out for referrals. Please be courteous when promoting The Ledge by not spamming other web sites with your referral link just to gain referrals.

The administrator may have enabled RSS syndication, this allows you to view newly created threads in guest viewable forums without visiting the board.

The feeds are currently provided in two formats, RSS and RSS v2. The differences are as follows:

• RSS 0.91 - This feed is based on a standard written by netscape and provides a link and the title of the thread.
  http://ledge.fleetwoodmac.net/external.php?type=rss
• RSS 2.0 - This feed contains title, author, date and the contents of the first post of the thread.
  http://ledge.fleetwoodmac.net/external.php?type=rss2

To add this to MyYahoo click here.

The forums to which this applies can also be limited to specific guest viewable forums by adding another parameter to the URL containing the forumids as follows:
http://ledge.fleetwoodmac.net/external.php?type=rss2&forumids=123

If you would like the content to be generated for multiple forums you can separate the forumids by commas.

1. Linear Mode (Oldest First) - In this mode, posts are displayed chronologically from oldest to newest. Posts are shown in a flat mode so that many posts can be viewed simultaneously.
2. Linear Mode (Newest First) - This is the same as the above mode, except that posts are ordered in an opposite way (newest first).
3. Threaded Mode - In this mode, a tree is shown along with every post. This tree allows you to see the relationship each post has to others, in terms of who responded to whom. Only one post is shown at a time.
4. Hybrid Mode - This mode is a mixture of the linear and threaded modes. The post tree is displayed like in the threaded mode, but multiple posts are displayed simultaneously like in the linear modes.