Nothing major, but we have added a new Rule to our The Rules - Elite Fourum . And since I personally have never actually read the Rules thread until today I thought I’d make an actual thread to inform users of the change.
"Bumping threads that have a last post of over 3 months ago is against the rules. A warning will be given, and further action taken if it is continued. There are exceptions to this rule:
**Bumping a topic, no matter how old, with new or relevant information to what is being discussed is acceptable and infact encouraged.
**Bumping your own Collection thread is fine no matter how old the last post is."
If you need any clarification or have any questions about this new rule please respond in as accusatory and enraged fashion as possible.
Another new rule has been added. The rule is as follows:
“Members of the forum who openly engage in unscrupulous activity will not be tolerated. This type of activity includes but is not limited to: pack weighing, shill bidding, and opening eBay/PayPal cases without merit. We do not condone this activity; it will be moderated accordingly.”
If you have any questions or need clarification, feel free to message me or any other mod/admin. Happy posting!
5.4. Bumping your wants thread is only allowed if…
a. Your wants have changed drastically in the past 7+ days.
b. It has been greater than 2 weeks with no activity on your post.
Just a very simple administrative thing If you need clarification, feel free to message any mod or admin.
3.5 Expressly political posts are strongly discouraged as they derail threads and create unnecessary division. Passing jokes/references to political figures and current events are acceptable, but use your best judgement. Posts that serve only to advocate a political position/create a debate are subject to removal, and threads that devolve into political debates may be locked/removed.
After many political threads were locked/removed due to the vitriol they created, it has been an unspoken rule that politics are checked at the door here. We have many members with different life experiences, different views, and we should all respect each other. As always, use your common sense and judgement and avoid making posts about divisive political issues in order to maintain the best forum environment.
If you need clarification, please message a moderator!
Reviving this thread to clarify enforcement one of our rules:
2.5. All Ebay Rover/Affiliate links on the site and discord will be removed or replaced. Self-promoting off-site services and tools that are paid, generate rover links, or generate ad/sponsor revenue is prohibited.
This rule includes self-promoting your YouTube channels, web-based tools, and services. We want to strike a balance between allowing people to post interesting Pokemon-related content and avoiding excessive self-promotion. If you have a YouTube channel, you may make a thread alerting the forum to it, but you may not post any additional videos or updates in that thread unless they are directly related to the forum (e.g. responding to a forum discussion/debate, interviewing a forum member, etc.). Others are free to discuss your channel as much as they like in your thread.
If you have an off-site tool or service which generates revenue in any way, you must message a staff member before posting.
The enforcement change on this rule is not retroactive (e.g. if you currently have a thread promoting your channel/web tool/service it will not be removed) but future posts must adhere to the rule.
If you have any questions, feel free to message me.
Am I still allowed to post a collection video in my collection thread? I planned on making an update video of my entire Pikachu collection somewhere at the end of the year (I have posted two videos earlier at the end of 2017 and 2018 respectively).
If linking/embedding isn’t allowed anymore, is it still allowed to say something along the lines of: “I’ve uploaded a new video on my YouTube channel _insert_YouTube_name_here_, feel free to check it out.”?
PS: I don’t generate any revenue with YouTube lol. I barely upload tbh.
If it is not-for-profit can I share links as often as I feel it would be productive and useful to share? I’ve recently started up a blog: pichu.blog with the intent of posting informative articles about various Pichu cards (which naturally ends up having a broader reach than just Pichu). There are no adverts or tracking scripts and I’m intending for the articles to be heavily referenced as if they were more akin to scientific journals than “omg look my cardz yolo swag #rattata4lyf” (e.g. pichu.blog/unlimited-e1#references). These references may in turn end up linking through to YouTube channels and other for-profit content which is out of my control.
I’m all for having a forum which doesn’t allow shameless advertising, but I feel like if the advertising also serves a useful purpose (like a link through to a useful resource related to a thread) we shouldn’t be prohibiting members from sharing links to their own content. It also feels a bit hypocritical seeing as there’s a YouTube link in the site’s header which links through to an admin’s YouTube channel rather than a YouTube channel specifically relating to the forum itself.
Also what guarantees do we have that any web-based tools we make will not be effectively stolen by one of the staff members if we do first share it with them for permission? That’s what happened with my eBay price checking tool - which was also not for profit - and I was made to look like the bad guy because of it.
As a side note, I believe YouTube has a 4,000 subscriber requirement before videos can be monetised. I don’t own a YouTube channel and have no intention of making one, but for the sake of those here with small YouTube channels: are they allowed to link to their videos if they have less than 4,000 subscribers?
I believe the major goal of the rule is to have content and discussion live on efour. You can develop content elsewhere, but constant self promotion usually serves another purpose.
Plus those with less than 4k subs who spam links are generally building a brand to exist and be monetized past 4k.
i.e. You can do whatever you want offsite, but don’t use efour as your platform to promote. If you have content for efour, develop it and let it live here.
We are trying to strike a balance between allowing people to reasonably promote content the forum finds interesting and avoiding excessive self-promotion. Finding that balance is not easy and it is a work in progress. This rule tries to be as objective as possible but will be enforced at staff discretion. @pichufan , the rule would apply to your blog if you were to make a thread about it and continually post each time you made a new blog entry (that wasn’t explicitly related to the forum). If someone made a thread about something you posted about in your blog, and your blog provides necessary information. or an E4 thread/debate provided an idea for you to do research/a post, then that stuff could absolutely be posted. Others could also discuss your blog as much as they want. It does not matter if your content is monetized or not, that is impossible for us to reliably verify. What is important is the possibility of monetization and the excessive self-promotion.
Regardless of your opinions on what happened with your eBay price checking tool, things like that are easy to monetize in the background through hidden rover links, information collection, etc. We can’t have that happen on the forum and all tools must be checked by the staff. I think we all learned from that issue and considered it settled long ago, but if you still have problems with it, you can take it up with one of the staff.
As always, if you are unsure about a post, just PM one of us.
If you need clarification, feel free to message any mod or admin.