2025 NEW Rules & Protocols

The Gardeners Corner Admin Team would like to make members aware that the Rules and Protocols of Gardeners Corner have been updated with immediate effect in order to make them fit and conform for use in these days of modern Global Social Media.
Please note that it is policy for the Admin Team not to discuss such matters with members so, in keeping with that policy, members should not discuss the update on the Open Forum or attempt to discuss the matter with any member of the Admin Team."

1. Should any member, or members breach the Gardeners Corner Rules and Protocols they may receive a Warning or a permanent Ban depending on the severity of the breach.

2. Should a member have already received a Warning for breaching the Rules and Protocols and breach them again they will receive a permanent ban

3. In matters of extreme nature or behaviour, summary bans may be applied by a member of the Admin Team.

4. Please note that the actions listed above are final and that there is no appeals process on GC.

5. Should a member receive a Warning or a Ban then they should not attempt to appeal by contacting any member of the Admin Team in order to pursue a retraction of the Warning or Ban or to justify their reasons for breaching the Rules and Protocols. Bypassing a ban by creating another account (or sock) will result in the sock immediately being permanently banned; if the member is on a temporary suspension, both accounts will be permanently banned.

No replies to any such attempts will be given as the Admin Team do not discuss their Warning or Banning actions with members. Any member who ignores this ruling and has received a warning will be regarded as further breaching the Rules and Protocols and will be permanently banned.

6. PLEASE NOTE THAT ALL RULES ARE CONSIDERED BY STAFF ON A CASE BY CASE BASIS.

7. NO TROLLING: Members will not make any posts of an unpleasant or meaningless nature just to be deliberately annoying or insulting. Don't make posts that are inflammatory just to offend members. Any person judged to be a Troll will be banned permanently.

8. NO PORNOGRAPHY: includes any and all pornographic, sexually offensive, sexually explicit, or objectifying material or language. Any sexually suggestive images will immediately be deleted and the member banned.

9. NO SPAMMING OR ENGAGEMENT FARMING: No member is to post material regarding the advertising of their Company, Business, including posts, links and PMs, and/or posts with the primary intent of leading members to another site or forum. This includes 'engagement farming' be that human or AI derived. In the event that the Admin Team believe a member/account to be spamming/farming in this way, the account will be instantly and permanently banned, with no appeal.
Members will refrain from COMMERCIAL OR TRADE advertising without permission from the Webmaster or the Admin Team. Members must not use their Company name or reference to that Company in their Avatar, User Name, or in their signature.

10. NO FLAMING OR AD HOMINEM ATTACKS:: No member is allowed to make personal attacks on any other member or of the Admin Team. Criticise ideas, not people. Personal attacks are defined as Personal, Racial, Ethnic, and/or Gender based insults, slurs, or derisive comments. This includes spite reporting or other similar forms of harassment via private messages or anything similar.

11. NO BYPASSING THE PROFANITY FILTER OR USING PROFANE LANGUAGE. Despite the modern tendency to make normal use of certain oaths or swear words or other insulting or potentially insulting words or terminology, their use on this forum will be closely scrutinised and moderated according to staff consensus. Alternative wordings such as bl@@dy or bu99ger come within this rule. If you see the profanity filter has been activated, please edit your post immediately and correct it. Posts may be edited or even temporarily deleted until a decision is made.

12. PEACE AND HARMONY OF THE BOARD will not be disrupted. Definition of this will be determined on a case by case basis by the Admin staff. This also includes issues that tend to be inflammatory to other members such as cats, foxes, 'vermin' and means of deterring, disposing of same. Posts or threads referring to inhumane or other objectionable means of dealing with any pets or wildlife will be summarily dealt with by the Admin Team and may incur penalties to the poster.

13. NO OFF TOPIC POSTING : threads will not be deliberately derailed by off-topic posting for the purposes of causing disruption or dissent.

14. NO INVASION OF PRIVACY: Members should not post their personal details such as addresses, phone numbers or e-mail addresses, or other members’ personal details without the permission of the Admin Team.

15. NO DISCUSSION OF ADMIN ACTIONS: Do not discuss staff actions publicly. If you are reported, do not discuss it in public forums. Do not discourage other members from using the report system. Do not contact the Admin Team as they will not discuss any such actions with any member nor will they reply to such a PM. Such PMs will be regarded as a further breach of the rules.

16. NO BYPASSING BANS: bypassing a ban and/or creating another account (or sock) will result in both accounts immediately being permanently banned. Invoking another member to post a message on their behalf will also deemed to be bypassing the ban. Additionally the messenger will be given an official warning.

17. NO DISCUSSION OF GOOGLE ADS: NO discussion of Google ads to be made in the forums. This is a contractual issue required by Google

18. COPYRIGHT articles subject to copyright may be quoted with an acknowledgement of the originator.

19. Changes in legislation: Please be aware of recent plans to amend the Contempt of Court Act 1981 and not comment on ongoing legal cases within the United Kingdom.

20. Students' and other Surveys: Such surveys are not allowed to be posted on the Forum without the permission of the Administrators [it needing only one to give permission for the survey to be posted]. Any surveys that are posted without first asking for the permission of Administrative Staff will be deleted and a PM sent to the Survey originator. No survey must contain direct, or indirect, commercial links or references to Companies, Businesses, brands, or manufacturers’ products. If a satisfactory explanation from the originator of the survey cannot be given then both the survey and originator will be permanently banned.

21. NO POINTLESS RESURRECTION OF OLD THREADS: Whilst we always encourage updates to existing threads, particularly where there is new/updated information or to update on the evolution of an idea or project, members MUST NOT resurrect a thread that has lain dormant, only to add a meme or other tenuously related link. Anyone doing so will be suspected of doing so for spamming/engagement farming purposes and thus in breach of rule 9. For the purposes of clarity, an old thread is deemed to be any thread that has not had a reply for a period of 24-months or more.

 

As we live in an ever-changing world, please note the updated rules above. For the sake of clarity, the changes are the addition of this into rule 9:



And the addition of a new rule entirely, rule 21:



With particular emphasis on the highlighted section. This does not prevent any member for resurrecting a thread for genuine update/further discussion.

 

We are very lucky to have excellent members here and that is in fact a very good example where members flagged that up to us to help us deal with it effectively. The thanks is definitely also due to everyone here for helping us keep this a pleasant place to post.

 

@Tinkerton all you do is press the 'Report' button at the bottom of the post you wish to flag. Then you will be prompted for the reason why and it comes straight to us admin team.