The Facebook rules system is a little inflexible, and non-obvious, so to counter this, our Facebook Group rules can be found here. We provide a clear list of them and our reasoning behind them so to avoid typing it in responses on facebook!
Our rules are concise, and based on common sense, so you don’t have to think too hard when following them. We welcome all input, so please do let us know if you believe they can be improved.
The Rules
- Limited business promotions on Mondays only. No repeat within 6 months. CONTRIBUTING members during Mondays ONLY. Group sponsorship options available, drop a message to En Admins to discuss. No spammy advertising competitions.
- Promote events effectively- do not repeat post. Post an event, rather than an image. Post once ahead of the event, and once on the day if you like. Post at https://eastleigh.online/c/eastleigh-local-events/15
- Be neighbourly, kind, and courteous. Please don’t post anything offensive or anything that directly attacks either a person or business. Any post or person seen to be inflammatory will be removed. Don’t like it? Ignore it!
- No swearing, hate speech or bullying. Swearing, bullying, racism, trolling, personal, or violent threats are not allowed. Be respectful of other peoples opinions and beliefs. Debate the topic, not the individual!
- Give more than you take from your neighbours . No business pages. Charity request posts only for members in positive contribution karma. (Exceptions for useful events & knowledge share).
- Respect each-others privacy. Eg, no car registration plates.
- Must be relevant to Eastleigh borough, and engaging. Must be relevant to Eastleigh Borough, or explain how it is relevant! Write something! Do not dump/share an article, event, post or page without useful or constructive comment to explain your post.
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No items for sale. (exception: Rule #1 – business posts), however you can post free things.
- Limited political canvassing is allowed. Strictly one post per candidate per election. Comments may be closed after 24 hours. Group rules will be strictly enforced for the duration.
- Avoid Mayhem! No posts, comments or memes which put down people, parties, or generalised groups of people. No fake news, no spam. Stay on topic. Don’t ridicule people trying to do good.
Why can’t I share a post?
Eastleigh Neighbours is a closed group, which unfortunately means Facebook remove the sharing option from posts. It also means your Facebook friends list won’t be able to nosy at what you’re commenting on :). If you want to share a post you have three alternative options:
- The easiest – take a screen shot, and post or send that picture.
- The hardest – ask the poster to share it on their personal page, click to visit their page, and then share the post from there. Go comment on the post in the Eastleigh Neighbours group to help it spread to more people.
- The brave and new - ask the author to post the article here on discourse, which is fully public and google indexed, the link will then be able to be shared far and wide.
Why no swearing?
You don’t know your audience! Would you really walk into a room of 15,000+ people and swear loudly to them all?
Swearing offends people and swearing breeds swearing, do we really want to teach our kids the art of public swearing? The other aspect is that when you swear it is often the first emotional response that comes into your head. When typing to so many people, we would prefer you to think more before you type to encourage more ‘stable’ discussions.
Swearwords often only emphasise and encourage negativity and do not help get your point across, while also encouraging an emotionally charged response back from others. The exception to this would be if you are quoting someone, or discussing swearing itself.
There are plenty of other resources available online discussing this topic, here’s a handy link I found discussing why you shouldn’t swear online.
Why the restriction on business adverts?
People often search for local groups to look to advertise their business. If just 10% of our 6,000+ users shared their business or page once a month, we would end up with 450 business posts a month ! Consider that at this level of spam, your target audience would likely leave the group as as they would not be interested in 99% of the posts.
This noise would drown out the original intention of your own post, leaving an echo-chamber of business adverts. If the group had 50 business posts a week, I myself would likely be leaving through boredom.
This said, we are always looking for better ways to help, this website being one example. If you are looking to advertise your business and would like to discuss, please reach out to us.
Why no business profiles?
We’ve found that business profiles are here for the advertising. We’re a local community group, so would prefer people speak as individuals. So we welcome businesses, but please – come as yourselves, rather than hidden.
Why has an admin deleted my post?
Are you sure an admin did? Remember the post owner can also delete! Usually admin will tell you by responding and letting you know. If we did have to remove your comment or post, to be honest what you did is probably pretty bad, as we encourage free speech, and prefer to operate with low-interference.
How can I get barred?
Serious rule breaking, persistent minor offences, or winding up the admins. Basically, don’t cause work for your admins, and be nice to your fellow neighbour!
Why can’t I comment on posts?
Usually you have broken a rule, and so have been muted. Occasionally when admin’s are busy we may issue a mute in error. Please message the En Admins to ask about your specific case, we promise to be honest, fair and level headed and expect the same of you in return. 99% of the time, if you apologise and promise not to do it again, we’ll undo the mute early.
Why didn’t admin contact me to tell me I was muted?
There are a few reasons. Facebook block people that contact too many non-friends on messenger. Historically we did attempt to communicate with all members breaching rules, but many did not respond. Rule violations continued until we had to remove members from the group. This resulted overly cumbersome administration, and unfair removal of members due to minor violations. The onus is on members to comply with the rules, not on admin to babysit the people that can’t follow them.
I have another question about the rules or how something works.
Hit reply and state your question here on discourse.