By Courtesy of Brutal.

The first point to note is that these are guidelines not rules, there are no absolute rules, and they are provided to assist you in enjoying the Nexus Forums.

The Forums are a bit like going to your friend's house and having a discussion about the weather or any (and I do mean any) topic that interests you. Like meeting any new people for the first time you may well be nervous about talking to a stranger, and these guidelines are here to ease those nerves.

• When you first go to the Forums, you will be asked to provide a nickname, and a password. Nexus is designed to provide as much or as little anonymity as you desire. You will not be asked for any personal details at all, and the nickname and password screen are there only to ensure that messages posted by you have your nickname on them. Having said that, it's a good idea to enter your email address (it's optional), so you can be notified of new postings, informed of updates, outages and weirdnesses, and generally kept up-to-date.

• Once you have chosen your nickname and entered the Forums you will be presented with a screen detailing new messages available; select a Forum that piques your interest and have a read. The Forums are quite busy, so there will be literally hundreds of messages available. When you've picked your Forum, the first message will appear. Scroll down to the bottom and you'll find a 'Jump To' box. We suggest 'Jumping' to somewhere around 20 messages short of the 'high message' in your Forum of choice.


(Handy Hint: A good 'shortcut' is to go to the 'Utilities' menu and select 'Reset Pointers'. Set them all to 20 messages short of the high message and you're all set to start!)
 

• One of the first things you will probably note is that some messages bear no real relation to the heading chosen. Don't worry, Nexus is an open house and discussions ebb and flow depending on the participants. When reading the messages, be aware that some Nexians know each other very well and use certain words and icons to represent the tone of their message and do have discussions that can appear extremely heated. By having a good read through the messages you will start to get a feel for the tone. Remember you can read further back if you desire, just use the 'Jump To' facility.

• Get yourself a feel for how messages are generally formatted. Use the 'Preferences' to find a style you feel comfortable with, or hand-code it yourself using standard HTML. You choose. Just make sure the quoted text is differenciated from your new input somehow. Be aware that '{' starts a quote in your chosen format, and '}' ends it. You'll find several 'conventions' in use here; either pick one, or start a trend - maybe.

• Having had a good read through some of the messages, if during your read you find something that you'd like to respond to, go to the bottom of the message, click on reply, and enter your response. Don't think that you are intruding or jumping in halfway through a conversation, all comments are welcome. The key here is YOUR RESPONSE, type what you want to say, how you want to say it and if you make an oops, relax. It happens to all of us. Sometimes frequently.

• If you feel that you don't want to reply to an existing message, then create a new one; I recommend the Open House Forum for this but again it's only a recommendation, even if it's only "hello I'm nickname". A little bit more information is nice as it enables people to strike up a conversation with you. Information recommended, likes, dislikes, hobbies etc. Information not required: Real Name, where you live, phone number etc. Nexus is an open site and as such is basically open to the world and private information is not necessary.

• If you post a message, the next time you logon you will probably be greeted with personal messages. The Forums are busy, so you may well get a response much sooner than you might expect.

• While we don't have a problem with 'short' messages (one-liners), we do expect some content. 'Yeah, right' would not go down well.

• The people who frequent Nexus most definitely enjoy a good chat, they can and do swear, can go a little crazy, they have families (well some), and in short are real people. If you aren't sure about posting the first time on, come back and have another read. There are no restrictions on either topics discussed or language used, so if you offend easily, use your back-button NOW!

• Remember,You are talking to Real People. If you are rude, they will probably be rude back. If you are polite, they will probably be polite back. If you are really rude, obscene, or engage in major personal attacks, don't be surprised if it is seriously frowned upon and any continuation of this would probably result in the offender getting booted. No one wants it, and no one truly deserves it.

• If you have an opinion on a topic that doesn't conform to the popular thinking, please voice (type) that opinion! Discussion thrives on opinion, and that's what these forums are about. Discussion.

Disclaimer: All the above is (sort-of) true and accurate, but conditions vary from planet to planet, so it's possible that none of it applies to you. The management reserves the right to be totally unreasonable and completely insane if we feel like it. While we may totally agree with what Brutal has stated above, we reserve the right to deny this page exists if anyone tries to hold us to it.