[SoLiDUS]

The topic of SPAM seems to come up quite a bit in this section of our dear
forum and even though the concerns exhibited by my fellow moderators is
warranted to some extent, in another it is simply foolish to even bring up.

Before I continue, SPAM must first be defined so as to avoid any possible
confusion. I have chosen to describe it as follows:

The posting of massive pieces of irrelevant, innapropriate information or
material in regards to the established forum rules.

Now that we have a proper definition, we can proceed to the concerns and
typical "SPAM occurences". The first part I would like to adress is the one
relating to MASSIVE amounts of posted information: granted, several new
threads or posts (under the same topic) by the same person can be quite
annoying so here are some general guidelines concerning the quantity and
speed of posting new information:

- Unless you strongly believe your new posts are worthy and justified, with
good reason (which relates to common sense, let's not get into semantics
here), chances are you just spammed.

- Unless you strongly believe your new topics are worthy and justified, with
good reason (which relates to common sense, let's not get into semantics
here), chances are you just spammed. Keep in mind this has to do with a
person posting several new threads in a very small time interval.

Concerning IRRELEVANCY of new posts or threads: this is a very delicate
subject. One must understand that most postings and threads are matters
of opinion (unless the topic or post specifically deals with facts) and thus,
are subjective in nature. Since different people place a different amount
of importance on any particular subject, it isn't always easy to judge how
something should be considered SPAM. With new topics, unless it is shown
that they have no quantifiable value, they cannot be deemed SPAM under
the criteria of irrelevancy: as stated above, they must be dealt with another
way. Posts are a different matter: using the method of contrasts, through
common sense, we can determine whether a post in a specific topic is spam
or not.

INNAPROPRIATE information is easier to define, as it has less to do with
subjectivity and more to do with the already pre-existing rules Badscript
made initially. Repeated and excessive cursing, posting of pornographic
material and personal attacks are examples which readily come to mind.
This is not a section with requires much more elaboration so I will move
on to my final thoughts on this topic.

Throughout this essay, I've tried to define SPAM and enumerate the different
ways a person might do so. I understand that several topics and posts might
seem irrelevant or innapropriate at first glance but upon further investigation
and inspection, they could very well be worthy additions to the forum section.
I honestly don't believe we have that big of a problem with SPAM in the O-T
section of the AA.COM Forum and a reason we should lower our guard from now
on is simple: this is an OFFTOPIC forum. Whatever doesn't and shouldn't fit
into the other sections, so long as it isn't spam, must therefore have a place,
here.

I hope this clears things up and helps you better understand the position of
some of our members who seem constantly infuriated at the locking of their
topics or repeated warnings at their most recent posts. Thank you for your
patience.