Our rules for forums and public comments 

Network Yarmouth welcomes comments and contributions to its forums or comments boxes from all users, subject to certain rules

We want to encourage people to contribute to this website but we need certain rules in place so that this can be within reasonable boundaries. Currently we allow comments from users who are not logged in and may not be members of the site. Abuse of this system may mean we can only allow registered users to add comments
 
We post-moderate a comment, which means that we allow comments to go online first and then keep a close eye on them and remove anything unsuitable. To make this system workable, and legal, we need users to adhere to the following rules, based upon those used by the BBC
 

The House Rules

 
The House Rules which appear below are divided into two sections. Violation of any of the rules in the first section is likely to lead to the immediate suspension of your account and could lead to legal action being taken against you by the authorities or an aggrieved party. Be aware that in exceptional circumstances Network Yarmouth could be legally obliged to reveal your registration information and/or IP address to the authorities
Keep your contributions civil, tasteful and relevant. Please:

• No defamatory comments. A defamatory comment is one that is capable of damaging the reputation of a person or organisation. If successfully sued you could be held liable for considerable damages and costs

• Avoid contempt of court which means not posting anything that risks prejudicing on-going or forthcoming court proceedings

• Do not incite people to commit any crime, including incitement of racial hatred.

• Avoid breaking a court injunction (for example, naming an individual or speculating as to their current whereabouts after a court has issued an injunction against doing so)

• Do not post content which you've copied from someone else and don't own the copyright

• Do not post messages that are unlawful, harassing, defamatory, abusive, threatening, harmful, obscene, profane or racially offensive

• Do not make multiple postings. So that we can publish comments from as many different people as possible, participants should keep their number of contributions per debate to a reasonable level. Multiple posts from one individual, or small number of individuals, discourages many others who might otherwise wish to take part

Although breaking one of the house rules below is less likely to land you in court, the rules are still important for your own safety, the safety of others and to avoid causing offence. Violation of these rules may result in suspension of your membership

• No swearing. People of all ages read and contribute to Network Yarmouth. Please don't use profanities or other words which might offend them

• No spamming or flooding. Don't repost the same message, or very similar messages, more than once.

• Keep your posts relevant. Each Comment or Forum debate is about a particular story or issue of the day. Posts which aren't relevant lower the value of the debate for everyone and may be removed

• No advertising, promotion of products or services, or posting of web links (URLs). If you know of a worthy website relevant to the discussion, please inform the web editor at judith.edmonds@ntlworld.com 

• Post in English only. Posts containing languages other than English may be removed. Common greetings and salutations in languages other than English may be acceptable

• No capital letters. This is internet shorthand for raising your voice. You can make your point perfectly well in lower case so please take the caps lock off

• No impersonating. Impersonating someone (including other members) is unacceptable

• No inappropriate usernames (vulgar, offensive, etc) 

Copyright and the law

 
You own the copyright in your postings, articles and pictures, but you also agree to grant Network Yarmouth a perpetual, royalty-free, non-exclusive, sub-licensable right and license to use, reproduce, modify, adapt, publish, translate, create derivative works from, distribute, perform, play, and exercise all copyright and publicity rights with respect to any such work worldwide and/or to incorporate it in other works in any media now known or later developed for the full term of any rights that may exist in such content

If you do not wish to grant such rights to Network Yarmouth, it is suggested that you do not submit your contribution to this site

By submitting your contribution to this site, you also warrant that such contribution is:  your own original work and that you have the right to make it available to Network Yarmouth for all the purposes specified above; is not defamatory; and does not infringe any law

You also agree to indemnify Network Norwich against all legal fees, damages and other expenses that may be incurred by Network Yarmouth as a result of your breach of the above warranty

You also agree to waive any moral rights in your contribution for the purposes of its submission to and publication on the Network Yarmouth site and the other purposes specified above

You may not post any defamatory or illegal material of any nature. This includes text, graphics, video, and/or audio. Posting a message with the intention of committing or condoning an illegal act is strictly prohibited

You may not violate, plagiarise, or infringe on the rights of third parties including copyright, trademark, trade secret, privacy, personal, publicity, or proprietary rights
 

About your privacy

If you register with us, our registration process requires you to supply us with your email details, but we will only use this information to validate your account and for other service administration purposes

Disciplinary procedure
 

Violation of any of the rules above may lead to your membership account be temporarily suspended or terminated. Network Yarmouth additionally reserves the right to suspend or terminate any membership account at any time and at its sole discretion. While suspended, returning to the site by creating another account will constitute a further offence and will result in your account being closed permanently. Network Yarmouth reserves the right to delete any posting, at any time, for any reason, and is under no obligation to publish any work submitted