Community Guidelines

Academic Pursuit is a place for literate folks like you to gather and discuss global trends, world politics, culture, literature, art, belief, science, money and more. And in particular how all of that relates to your life.

The site is also a means for you and/or your company to get involved with the community. AcademicPursuit.org features articles, forums and profiles offering ideas and perspectives. We invite your collaboration to enrich our site - everything from book recommendations to essays to reports about the diverse topics that influence our world. Great posts from our forums may be published in other parts of the Academic Pursuit website or in our "Go Further" newsletter, but we'll ask for your permission.

Get Going

We encourage all new visitors to stop by the forums and introduce themselves with a profile. This is also the place to review frequently-asked questions/answers about the Academic Pursuit website community and forum announcements.

Ownership of Words

One of the aspects that separates Academic Pursuit from many other online communities is that its members have the opportunity for their words to be shared with people outside their circle, by being published in an open forum. Your words are your own -- and all that entails!

When you post a message to Academic Pursuit, or to any forum, you grant us the right to display your message on the page on which it was posted by you. It may also be displayed on other pages on the site, or reachable through searches or other means, but it will always and only be here, and we have no intention of ever reusing, reprinting, or recreating your message anywhere else except by permission. You lose no copyright to your words, and you are not beholden to us in any way, shape, or form. By the way, that also works the other way around: we do not pay for your participation.

Identity

You are encouraged to use your real name when participating in our community. Experience has proven that this is essential to the continued growth of an online community, and in general is the best way for you to get to know others and for others to get to know you.

There are some exceptions. If you've been online for ten years and have always been known by the same username, we're not going to compel you to change it to participate in Academic Pursuit. Alternatively, if you feel you'd be putting yourself in danger by using your real name, you'd obviously be welcome to use a pseudonym. In all cases, we advise against sharing your street address and/or home or work phone number.

Etiquette

At Academic Pursuit, we believe that a sense of community ultimately emerges from the groups of people that make up that community. Communities create norms, which emerge from the group and are enforced informally by members. Such norms grow over time and are handed down to new users. It's these norms - not rules - that form the matrix of a community. The few rules we have are meant to encourage your participation and nurture the spirit of community: an interchange of ideas.

We hope that you, our users, will create discussions about appropriate norms. If instances arise where the norms the group creates are not sufficient, if modeling good communication fails, and if E-mail fails, we will delete or lock accounts. This last strategy is something we take seriously and never do lightly - it is because of our commitment to maintaining a community where people can have conversations.

We provide many places within Academic Pursuit to demonstrate the art and craft of expression. We believe in the axiom "tools, not rules," so rather than tell you what to do, we give you the ability to do things, and let you decide how and when to use them.

Therefore, please be careful how you word your posts. We believe that freedom of expression is important and censoring should be avoided when at all possible. We also recognize that tensions inevitably arise online and from time to time inflammatory topics surface. Online, it is very easy for something intended as sarcasm to be misinterpreted by someone, often sparking a conflict. Keep in mind that it is possible to disagree civilly. We'll make every effort to deal with these tensions, and encourage all users to participate in conferences and discussions peaceably. It's also a good idea not to post something in the heat of the moment. You'll almost certainly end up regretting it later.

Conduct and Legal Mumbo-jumbo

Academic Pursuit is fair and tolerant, but you can be barred from access. Show respect to others, don't spam and use common sense.

Academic Pursuit is not responsible for the accuracy or integrity of the information contained in any part of the site, and will not be held liable for any damages of any kind incurred as the result of any message posted on the site. Some messages and site content may contain links to sites on the Internet and World Wide Web other than the Academic Pursuit site itself. Academic Pursuit is not responsible for the content of these other sites.

The details. You agree, through your use of this service, that you will not use this site and its forums to post any material which is knowingly false and/or defamatory, inaccurate, abusive, vulgar, hateful, harassing, obscene, profane, threatening, invasive of a person's privacy, or otherwise violative of any law. You agree not to post personal information about someone other than yourself. You agree not to post any copyrighted material unless the copyright is owned by you or Academic Pursuit.

Privacy Policy

Academic Pursuit will not sell or give out your email address to any third party. We only use it to verify your account and contact you regarding Academic Pursuit. Your participation in the forums and/or services of Academic Pursuit or TIGS does not require your subscription to our newsletter, purchase of products and services from advertisers, nor enrollment in any of our (highly-recommended!) courses.

We publish our comprehensive Privacy Policy on our legal page.

 
 





 
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