We are currently averaging over 250 comments a day, and growing month over month. I thought this would be a good time to set up some ground rules for our forums in order to maintain a healthy and welcoming atmosphere that our reader and creator community has come to be known for.
1. There's Never a Wrong Time to be Polite
Always be courteous to your fellow Tapastic readers and creators. Don't forget that there is a real person behind every post, who, just like you, wants to be treated with respect and tolerance. Keep your cool even in the most heated discussions. Above all else, I want everyone to feel safe and welcomed in our forums. Any behavior that threatens the culture we've all helped to build will not be tolerated.
2. Tag, Search and Quote are Your Friends
I highly recommend trying to search for topics before creating a new topic (if you're asking a question, please search through the "ANSWERED" tag to check if it has been asked before). Be respectful of readers and creators, who have already created similar topics and have generated ongoing discussions. A great way to jump in an active topic is to quote an existing post or tagging someone already active in the topic to engage them. We want to reduce multiple topics dealing with the same issues to make the forums easier to navigate for everyone.
3. Do Not Solicit Sales on the Forums
Please refrain from trying to make any form of sales on our forums. Link dumping to a kickstarter or store front without contributing to the betterment of the forum will not be tolerated. If you want to promote your kickstarter, storefront, etc then please make a topic that will help the community (whether it's things you've learned, or questions about how to improve).
4. Report Posts When Necessary
We were able to survive the Great Baba-Ji Invasion of 2015 (so far), which has pushed us to adjust how reporting works on the forums. We use a two step authentication process, meaning it takes two reports for a single post to bury it for a moderator to review. We want everyone in the forum to contribute to maintaining the culture we've built up and that means empowering every user with the ability to report posts for being spam or hostile.
5. Have Fun
This might seem silly, but seriously, we want everyone here to be happy. This might be my personal tyrannical decree, but I really want everyone to want to be here. If you're not having fun on the forums, please think of why and what we can do to make it better. After that, I want you to reach out to me and we'll see what we can do to make things fun again.
I also want to take some time to introduce three members of our moderating team, @ratique, @CyndiFoster ,@Kaykedrawsthings and @UzukiCheverie . They've been longtime creators on Tapastic and have been instrumental in helping shape the community we see here today within our forums.
I don't want the forums to just see them as mods, who close down threads and fight off spam bots. They're not just mods, they're community leaders. As such, I hope we can all lead by example and not only continue this long lasting tradition of civility in the forums but also make it better day by day.
If you have any questions or think that a topic needs moderation please feel free to reach out to any of us and we'll be more than happy to help. See you in the next topic.
[EDIT: 06.20.16]
I've been seeing a lot more self promotional topics being made, which is fine. I'll be un-listing self promotional posts after they've been posted for a couple of days to reduce clutter on the forums. Please refrain from making multiple topic posts promoting the same comic.