Terms of Service

[Callum]

Terms of Service
v2.3.2 - 07 November 2024
Originally published 09 January 2019

Introduction

Welcome to the Song Contest Forums! The forums were founded on 8 August 2011 under the previous "Ourvision Song Contest" brand, and were previously known as the OVSC Forums until 2017. Some users who registered with the forums before the rebranding may still affectionately refer to the forums as OVSC.

Since 2011, The Song Contest Forums, henceforth referred to as SCF or the forums, have broadened their horizons and have become home to many song contests of varying longevity and popularity, including but certainly not limited to the North Vision Song Contest (NVSC), WWW Song Contest (WWWSC), Ourvision Song Contest (OVSC), Imagine Song Contest (ISC) and Fantasia Contest (FC). For the vast majority of contests, the real-life Eurovision Song Contest is the primary inspiration, thus the majority of our members share an interest in Eurovision, and therefore boards for Eurovision discussion are also hosted. Additionally, there is also room for discussion of everything unrelated.

At the heart of SCF lies the community - diverse, of varying age and constantly growing. As of August 2020, the forums have more than 2,000 members, with the amount constantly growing year by year.

It is the staff's duty to oversee the wellbeing of this community; however, the forum members also have a shared responsibility to ensure that both their own and others' wellbeing is maintained. All forum members, regardless of rank or stature in the forum, will be held accountable for their own actions. The purpose of this rulebook is to remove all unnecessary ambiguity that creates loopholes in the disciplinary process - which is extremely problematic for not only the staff but for the community as a whole. Contest hosts and "councils" also have an additional responsibility of maintaining the stability of their contest in every respect, except for when they choose to end their contest.

Participation on the forums is not a right, but a privilege. This privilege can be revoked at any time should the staff deem it necessary. The staff's decision on any matter ultimately overrides all, and must be taken seriously. When it comes to internal matters in song contests, contest hosts are the first port of call and the staff will only intervene if the situation begins to infringe on the overall rules.

The following rules apply to all components of the Song Contest Forums network:
• The forums themselves (forum.songcontests.eu)
• Branches of the songcontests.eu domain (the wiki and charts sites)
• The forum Discord
• The forum Skype chat, both through text and on call
• Any Messenger chats where there is a strong staff presence
• Any concerns brought forward by a member of the forums regarding (an)other member(s) of the forum, regardless of communication method, meaning that in certain situations, we might also hand out warnings for behaviour that occurred in other communities

All of the above forms of communication are under the staff's jurisdiction. Any move to undermine the staff's authority in the above areas will be met with serious consequences. The staff also has the authority to intrude on personal conversations if there is a valid reason to warrant it.

By being a current member, it is assumed that one agrees to the forums' Terms of Service. The Terms of Service do not apply retrospectively to any past offences, but they do apply to current investigations and all future offences.



Member ranks

In descending order, these are the ranks of the members on the forums. They indicate one's level of responsibility and duty.

Administrators: The highest rank of the forum hierarchy, administrators have full control over the forums, in regard to both its system and community. They have the power to (un)ban, delete and manage accounts, and are able to change the forum's interface as well. Administrators are promoted to this position on the grounds of their exemplar service to the forums, through a combination of effective discipline, upkeep and engagement with the community. Normally, administrators are promoted from the moderation team.

Moderators: The second-highest rank, moderators are similar to administrators with the exception of having comparatively less power, even though they share much of the powers administrators have too. Together with the administrators, they form an integral part of the staff team helping the staff come to a collective decision. Moderators are irregularly promoted, with the last application stage having happened in May 2024. To become a moderator, one must show great service to the forum as a whole, and their account must be in good standing - and can only be selected through either an application stage or if the staff collectively asks a member to join their team.

Technical Staff: Technical staff members are administrators and moderators that focus on technical tasks, such as board and thread regulation. They don't have any special powers, only different priorities in their tasks than the rest of the staff. Technical staff members should not be contacted in matters that involve rule breaches or conflict management, which is the priority of the non-technical staff members. Similarly, non-technical staff members are capable of completing the technical tasks, but should only be contacted in urgent matters when the technical staff members are offline.

Retired Staff: Retired staff members are previous administrators and moderators who served in the staff but have since stepped down or been removed due to extensive inactivity. They do not form part of the current staff team and should not be contacted with any issues to be dealt with. This rank is purely honorific, and is designed to praise the work they have done for the forums in the past. Retired staff members are able to rejoin the staff team whenever they wish.

Contest Hosts: Contest hosts are essentially people who manage everything to do with their own song contest. Contest hosts, upon meeting the necessary conditions, will get a board for their contest which they can manage with greater power than a regular member. They also have a symbolic power in the sense that they can remove participants from their contest within reason, and manage the contest community. Contest hosts are not members of staff, and some members of the staff team are also contest hosts themselves.

Contest Players and Regular Members: The standard user account that one is given upon registering. They have access to all the standard areas of the site and the normal user interface. "Contest Player" is given to anyone that participates in a contest, although this is an entirely honorific title. One can join the group by going to the Groups page on one's profile, the group itself will allow one to have more control over any board of which one is given moderator status on, such as being able to delete posts and mark threads as pinned.



Current staff members

In chronological order of accession, these members form the current staff lineup. For all general issues, these members are one's port of call. Feel free to contact a staff member in any way suitable.

Eke
Blandine
Anesović
kev
Julian
Laurinda
Dylan
Aliya
Oisín
ClassifiedCat
Chante™

One should avoid contacting staff members who have explicitly stated their inactivity.



Rulebook

Users under 13

Due to COPPA regulations, users below the age of 13 should practice extra caution, especially in private conversations with other members, and not publicly reveal their age. As a primarily European community, COPPA is not strictly enforced, however ProBoards, Discord and other websites with a presence of the SCF community reserve the right to terminate any account at any time should they have sufficient proof of age. The staff also reserves the right to freeze accounts of users under 13 if it is in their best interests.

Multiple accounts

A person can only have one account. Multiple accounts, upon discovery by the staff, will be deleted in due course. The staff considers identical IP addresses to be sufficient evidence. If the multiple accounts wish to contest the evidence, they will have to provide unique photographic evidence (with their face and username written down and together visible) in private, and with total confidentiality. If this is not provided, all accounts aside from the most active one will be deleted, and the active account will be warned accordingly.

Spamming

These Terms of Service set out three types of spamming which are not tolerated:

Nuisance spamming: This type of spamming is repeatedly post annoying material that serves no benefit whatsoever to the community, regardless of intent. An example would include posting "AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA" on various threads for no reason. Please have common sense to be able to know what qualifies as nuisance spamming. Penalties for this will vary based on the extent of the spam.
Objective spamming: This is spamming with a forum-based purpose - the most common reason for objective spamming is in order to meet the post limit for a contest waiting list. Objective spamming messages tend to be the same messages with little or no alterations, and it tends to stop after a certain milestone is reached (i.e. 25 or 50 posts). This is a warnable offence, and any contest hosts who enforce post limits are encouraged to watch out for this.
Advertising: Without direct permission from a member of staff, advertising a product, forum or other community not under the songcontests.eu domain, especially for the purpose of shifting the community elsewhere is forbidden. Members who have signed up solely for this purpose will have their accounts deleted. Members who have otherwise engaged with the community will be warned accordingly. Promoting a song contest on the forums is allowed within reason.

Flamebaiting

This is a forbidden offence. Flamebaiting is making a post or message, or doing anything with the intent to provoke a negative reaction or drama out of it, in an otherwise normal situation. Regardless of whether this causes the situation to escalate or not, flamebait posts will be deleted and the user making such remarks will be warned. Creating any form of hostile atmosphere on this forum is unacceptable.
An example of flamebaiting would be:

X:  "The contest's deadline is 01 January at 2359CET."
Y: "You don't know how to host a contest. Nobody sets their deadlines for that day. Clearly a wrong decision making this contest even worse."

Flamebaiting also covers any figure of speech that is designed to specifically aggravate a certain member or a group of people, regardless of its content.

Use of profanity

Profanity and swearing are not prohibited, but avoid excessive profanity as well as using it in a spiteful manner towards a certain user. Based on the nature of this community, certain slurs are conditionally acceptable under the same rules, however if it is not one's place to use a slur, they should not do so. Other slurs are completely unacceptable and will possibly warrant a strong warning and/or ban, depending on context.

Bullying

Under no circumstances is the bullying, torment or harassing of people or a person acceptable. It does not matter if the victims are aware or not of the bullying being done towards them. These forums pride themselves on their inclusive nature, and any threat to that inclusion will be dealt with harshly and without hesitation.

Here, bullying is used as an umbrella term for any of the following:
• A spiteful attack on any forum member(s)
• Spreading false rumours about any forum member(s)
• Name-calling or any other verbal abuse towards or about any forum member(s)
• Blackmailing any forum member(s)
• Repeatedly harassing any forum member(s)*
• And in general, any action done with the intent to harm, belittle and/or defame any forum member(s)

* - Further details on harassment can be found under the Harassment and personal safety section

And just to reiterate, it is still bullying even if the victim is not aware of it. Members of the forum are also encouraged to speak up if anyone is being unjustly attacked or bullied. Victims of bullying should report any issues to the staff. The penalty for such actions will be decided by the staff based on the severity of said actions.

NSFW content

The sharing and posting of NSFW content is entirely forbidden. Any images and/or videos containing sexually explicit material, as well as links to content of similar nature, will result in consequences. This includes personal explicit content ("nudes"). Due to previous occurences, the staff deems it important to note that any sharing of personal explicit content is strongly condemned.

If one is:
• Coerced or coaxed in an attempt to send personal explicit content against one's will
• In any case, send personal explicit content against one's will
• Blackmailed with the threat of past personal explicit content exchanges being leaked
• Fearful that one is being sexually exploited by a member

Contact any member of the staff immediately, with evidence sent in confidentiality if possible, and it will be dealt with as effectively and as safely as can be. The above points refer to solicitation and sexual exploitation, which are international criminal offences and do not have any place in this community. Anyone found to be engaging in those offences will be permanently banned without any room for appeal.

Sending sexually explicit content, including personal explicit content to minors is strictly and unequivocally forbidden. If a minor has provided one with personal explicit content, then keeping and/or distributing said content counts as owning and distributing child pornography, in which case the staff may be required to contact the authorities in addition to handing out a permanent ban from the community.

Harassment and personal safety

Every member has the right to feel safe and secure while using any part of the SCF network. If at any point one feels harassed, intimidated or unsafe while using the network, they should inform a staff member.

Harassment is classified as any of the following:
• Excessive and/or unwanted attention which does not stop upon request
• Any content sent to one that they are uncomfortable with, of any nature
• Anything of an intimidating nature, such as threats 
• Anything originating from the SCF network that compromises one's safety offline

Some members of the forums also meet up with each other in real life, and in most cases they go smoothly and without any problems. However, one must ensure that they are fully comfortable with meeting up with anyone from the forums and that the meetup is a mutual decision. If they do not wish to meet up, they should not be afraid say no. If at any point one feels their personal safety offline is compromised as a result of someone else's actions on the network, tell a staff member.

Communicating in foreign languages

English is the main language of communication on this forum. In "The Lounge" board, threads for specific languages can be found where users can talk in said languages. Please refrain from speaking in a foreign language anywhere else, especially for lengthier periods of time. The full rules apply to any remarks made in a foreign language. On the Discord server, specifically designated regional channels for discussion in languages other than English also exist.

Zero Tolerance Policy (ZTP) regarding discrimination

Any use of racism, homophobia, transphobia, xenophobia, sexism, ableism etc. and the corresponding slurs and microaggressions will be punished, either with a percentage or a verbal warning, depending on the intent and whether it's a repeat offender. Blatantly racist, homophobic, etc. statements will be punished with an immediate ban, microaggressions will be judged according to a three strike system, which gives someone, who was simply uneducated, the chance to educate themselves, while still stopping anyone from producing too many repeated microaggressions. This rule also applies to other sites and communities, so don't live under the illusion that you can be racist, homophobic, etc. outside of this server, without facing any consequences on here.

Avatars, profile covers, mini-profile backgrounds and signatures

Avatars, profile covers, mini-profile backgrounds and signatures must not contain strobe lights as this triggers seizures in those suffering with epilepsy and other similar conditions.

Users are encouraged to ensure their signature is as compact as possible. This is so they do not clutter threads and become problematic for people with slow internet speeds.

One's signature must adhere to the following conditions:
• It must contain no more than four images, with a maximum of 2 GIFs
• Images which span all of the signature space must be scaled down with either BBCode or another online service

The staff will change any signatures in breach of these conditions to a more appropriate size without any penalty, but deliberately reverting it back to its original size will result in consequences.

Loopholing

Loopholing, or rule skirting, is finding or attempting to find a loophole in the rulebook in order to cause harm without directly breaking the closest rule to that user's action. This will only make matters worse, and may result in further penalties.

Backseat moderation and vigilantism

The staff are the only members of the forums who have the authority to hand down discipline to its members, and all staff members come to a collectively accountable and thought-through decision. Although constructive opinions regarding those decisions are welcome, do not attempt to do the staff's job for them. Committing an act of so-called "heroism" in which one brings a member down without the staff's ultimate cooperation (vigilantism) is forbidden. Please utilise the internal report system on the forums, or otherwise message any member of the staff to report an issue, and please note that any acts of vigilantism will be met with penalties, and vigilantism is not an act of martyrdom.

Discourse on COVID-19

On March 11, 2020 the World Health Organisation declared the spread of SARS-CoV-2 - the virus that causes the illness COVID-19 - a pandemic. In the coming days, many world governments ordered national lockdowns and shutting down of non-essential services in order to prevent the spread of the virus and, ultimately, the illness. At least 4.4 million people are known to have died from COVID-19 itself and its complications.

It must be stressed that COVID-19 is an extremely dangerous illness and that it is important to break the spread of transmission of the virus that causes it. Through the implementation and adherence to national rules to prevent the spread, as well as the ongoing vaccination effort, the outlook is much better. However, it is still important to protect the integrity of those two vital components to preventing the further loss of life.

On March 23, 2020, ProBoards issued a notice to all admin teams on all of its forums that it is strictly forbidden for misinformation on COVID-19 and SARS-CoV-2 to be spread on any of its forums. This is not a rule that we implemented ourselves, yet it is one that we fully support and have extended it across our whole network. This rule still applies today.

We are also very pro-vaccine, and believe vaccination is necessary to slow and prevent the chain of transmission of both the virus and illness. As such, antivax discourse of any kind is not allowed on any part of our network.

It is strictly forbidden to:
• Question or deny the existence of SARS-CoV-2 and COVID-19
• Spread any misleading or incorrect information regarding the virus and illness
• Underplay the seriousness of the illness and spread of the virus
• Encourage one to break any regulations imposed by one's local jurisdiction
• Question the efficacy and need for vaccination
• Encourage the choice to not take a vaccine and/or promote vaccine hesitancy.

Anyone found to be infringing any of the above rules will be handed down the appropriate penalty. The staff advises you to follow the rules of your local jurisdiction, and to receive a vaccine whenever possible.

Appealing a decision

A member is allowed to challenge the staff's decision to ban or warn them within the first week of their penalty being handed down - after the first week, a member no longer has the opportunity to appeal that specific penalty. They must acknowledge that for the staff to hand down a warning or ban, a viable reason warranted that penalty, and must not purport the staff to be tyrants or dictators. Additionally, they will also need to explain - in detail - why they feel their penalty was unjustified to the staff, who will reconsider the penalty without any guarantees. Some inexcusable penalties such as solicitation and ones unequivocally found to be an infringement of the Terms of Service cannot be appealed.

Reporting posts and messages

To report a post on the forums, just click on the gear button at the top right of a post, and then select "Report Post" from the dropdown menu. A box will then show up where a reason can be input, and then it will be sent to the staff for consideration.
Do not report posts as an attempt at humour, this does nothing more than inconvenience the staff and will result in a warning being handed down immediately.
To report a message on any other part of the SCF network, one should contact the staff via a direct message, providing evidence and a reason for reporting a user or situation.



Methods of discipline

Warning levels

Also known as percentages, this is the system used to discpline a member while not compromising their participation in the activities of the forums. They are intended to deter people from reoffending in future. Warning levels range from 0% to 100%. Warning levels are handed out as 5%, 25% and 50% depending on the severity of an offence and the time in between individual offences.

Requests to reduce or remove one's warning level will be ignored unless there is very good reason to do so.

Only yourself and the staff can see your own warning level.

Temporary bans

Temporary bans constitute the restriction of access to the forums for a certain set period of time. It is possible for the duration of a temporary ban to be indefinite, though a typical length for a temporary ban lasts between two weeks and a month, but may last longer. The staff also holds the right to not inform a user of when their ban will be lifted. All temporary bans will be collectively decided and handed down by the staff.

Permanent bans

Permanent bans constitute the restriction of access to the forums indefinitely. These are only handed down in the most extreme cases, or when all routes of discipline have been exhausted.

Demotion

If a staff member has committed a serious offence, one possible method of discipline is to remove them from the staff team on a permanent basis, in what is known as demotion.

This is not to be confused with a demotion due to inactivity - this is not a disciplinary action and inactive staff members are instead moved to the Retired Staff rank, and may eventually be repromoted.

Other forms of discipline

Symbolic warnings may be handed down without warning level increases, access to certain boards or other parts of the network may also be blocked. The staff has the right to hand down any form of discipline should the situation call for it.



Please also refer to the ProBoards Terms of Service, which applies for anything beyond the staff's control.


Changelog:

SPOILER: Click to show

v2.3.2 - Update of the Staff Members list (07 November 2024)
v2.3.1 - Update of the Staff Members list (31 December 2021)
v2.3.0 - "Discrimination and insensitivity" section replaced by new "Zero Tolerance Policy" section. Clarification on rule breaches outside of the SCF network was added. (29 October 2021)
v2.2.0 - Addition of the "Discourse on COVID-19" section. Various typo fixes and clarifications. (22 August 2021)
v2.1.0 - Addition of the Technical Staff rank and update of the Staff Members list (10 May 2021)
v2.0.5 - Small rewording (21 February 2021)
v2.0.4 - Typo fix (21 February 2021)
v2.0.3 - Typo fix (17 February 2021)
v2.0.2 - Update of the Staff Members list (02 February 2021)
v2.0.1 - Minor fixes. (14 September 2020)
v2.0.0 - Partial, but important rewrite of the Terms of Service. (07 August 2020)
v1.1.2 - Lessened importance of Messenger and increased importance of Discord following move in April. (17 July 2020)
v1.1.1 - Minor formatting changes. (20 April 2019)
v1.1.0 - "Harassment and personal safety" section added. Post reformatted. Clarifications made to "Advertising" subsection and "Appealing a decision" section. Minor changes to "Bullying" and "Backseat moderation and vigilantism" sections. (20 April 2019)
v1.0.4 - Clarification added to the "Advertising" subsection of the "Spamming" section (10 January 2019)
v1.0.3 - Update to the "Permanent bans" section (09 January 2019)
v1.0.2 - Addition to the Introduction (09 January 2019)
v1.0.1 - Clarifications added to the Warning levels and Ranks sections. After the immediate aftermath of an offence, you cannot appeal for a warning level to be changed. Some more info added on the "Contest Player" rank. (09 January 2019)
v1.0.0 - Terms of Service published. (09 January 2019)