The
TGE Chat Experience
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We make every effort to ensure that the chat experience in any of our rooms
is a safe, pleasant one by providing our own chat hosts
/ hostesses to moderate problems. In addition, our directors are encouraged
to participate in chats. However, being a 24 hour / 7 day a week continuous
operation there will be times when no official TGE representative is available.
And it is for just that reason that we have adopted the policy outlined
on this page to maintain the integrity of our chat program. |
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Chat
Passive Resistance Policy
The vast majority of the time the people that you meet and interact with
in chat will be courteous and respectful of others feelings, however just
like in the "real world" there are occasionally insensitive or disruptive
individuals that will find their way into the room. These people try to
disrupt the conversation by verbally bashing with insults, curse words,
etc. Such behavior is a violation of our chat host Excite's Chat
Community Standards. And even though we are not an official Excite
Community room, such standards are still enforceable under Excite's Terms
of Service.
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One should keep in mind that
not everything to which one might take offense is inappropriate. For example,
simply stating a view (even a negative one) is not bashing. If it is reasonably
polite conversation, even if it makes you cringe with its stupidity or
insensitivity, it isn't bashing. But on the other hand, if the "conversation"
consists of someone yelling profanity, or is clearly meant to be insulting
and/or disruptive, then we recommend the following steps:
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Do not
attempt to argue with such an individual in the room itself. To do so generally
only makes matters worse by inciting the person to continue or increase
their disruptive behavior.
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Do use
the VP Chat IGNORE
feature, and suggest to others in the room that they might do the same.
This blocks the disruptive person's words from your screen and once they
realize that they are no longer being read they usually get bored and give
up. To activate ignore, click on the offensive persons avatar picture or
name, and choose ignore from the pop up menu.
In very rare circumstances a harrassing individual may continue to return
on later occasions to continue their disruptive or abusive behaviour. Should
that be the case you should make every effort to document and report these
standards violations to the proper representatives of Excite in the following
manner:
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Save a
copy of the offending chat text. To do this choose "Save dialog as" from
the file menu in the upper left hand corner of the chat program window.
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Request
the assistance of a Excite VP Chat Host. To locate a Host choose "Hosts
Online Now" from the chat rooms directory. You will need to provide
the name & url of the chat room, the offending persons chat name, and
a brief description of the problem.
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Hosts
generally do not need to enter a room to perform their duties, but rather
may watch from the observers box. While a Host is observing the room do
not send IMs to them, if you must make a comment do so in the room. Do
not
complicate matters by dropping to the level of the basher by typing inappropriate
language in the room or the Host may be required to warn you,
too.
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Sometimes
the offensive person is smart enough to keep quiet once a Host appears.
If that happens, go to Excite's Chat
Feedback page, fill out the form and paste the saved chat text showing
the harrassment into your message. They will investigate and may be able
to take action.
Sometimes this type of harrassment will happen in IMs, should this be the
case we suggest the following options:
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You can
turn off the IM feature. To do this select preferences from the Tools menu
at the top of the chat program window, place a check in the box where it
says "Ignore all IMs". This will block all incoming IMs, but you will still
be able to send them.
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Click
on the IM window and convert it to a tab. Once you have done this you can
save a copy of the offensive text, and then proceed as shown above for
contacting Excite.
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