Community Guidelines

Community.lsst.org is a commons for project staff and the scientific community to collaborate and build the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope. An inclusive, collaborative environment is necessary to support a broad, diverse group of individuals as they contribute their best effort.

This forum should be treated with the same respect you would a public park. This is a shared community resource — a place to share knowledge and opinions through ongoing conversation. We are all responsible for following the LSST Code of Conduct and flagging issues for moderator intervention. Use the following guidelines to keep this a clean, well-lighted place for civilized public discourse.

Please also refer to LSST’s Communications Code of Conduct. The page you’re on is a helpful reference specifically for the LSST Community forum.

Elements of LSST Workplace Culture

Interactions on the Community forum reflect LSST’s workplace culture:

  1. Be kind. LSST realizes the impact of kindness to empower individuals to act in ways that strengthen ourselves, our relationships and our communities.
  2. Trust. An inclusive, collaborative environment is best achieved when there is mutual trust, based upon honest behavior, throughout the community.
  3. Respect. Inclusive environments foster excellence by challenging us to consider a variety of viewpoints and approaches. We honor alternate viewpoints as opportunies for discussion and learning, and therefore treat others with respect, even if we disagree.
  4. Diverse. Valuing diversity recognizes differences between people and acknowledges that these differences are an asset, bringing strength to a community through new ideas, innovation, and creativity.
  5. Inclusive. By being inclusive, LSST strives to create an environment of involvement, respect, and connection that values and benefits from diverse backgrounds and perspectives.

Value diversity

Recognize that our project includes individuals with different communication styles. All voices must be heard to promote excellence. Share the air. Raise all voices.

Improve the Discussion

Help us make this a great place for discussion by always working to improve the discussion in some way, however small. If you are not sure your post adds to the conversation, think over what you want to say and try again later.

The topics discussed here matter to us, and we want you to act as if they matter to you, too. Be respectful of the topics and the people discussing them, even if you disagree with some of what is being said.

One way to improve the discussion is by discovering ones that are already happening. Please spend some time browsing the topics here before replying or starting your own, and you’ll have a better chance of meeting others who share your interests.

Be Agreeable, Even When You Disagree

You may wish to respond to something by disagreeing with it. That’s fine. But, remember to criticize ideas, not people. Please avoid:

  • Name-calling.
  • Ad hominem attacks.
  • Responding to a post’s tone instead of its actual content.
  • Knee-jerk contradiction.

Instead, provide reasoned counter-arguments that improve the conversation.

Your Participation Counts

The conversations we have here set the tone for everyone. Help us influence the future of this community by choosing to engage in discussions that make this forum an interesting place to be — and avoiding those that do not.

Discourse provides tools that enable the community to collectively identify the best (and worst) contributions: favorites, bookmarks, likes, flags, replies, edits, and so forth. Use these tools to improve your own experience, and everyone else’s, too.

Let’s try to leave our park better than we found it.

If You See a Problem, Flag It

Moderators have special authority; they are responsible for this forum. But so are you. With your help, moderators can be community facilitators, not just janitors or police.

When you see bad behavior, don’t reply. It encourages the bad behavior by acknowledging it, consumes your energy, and wastes everyone’s time. Just flag it. If enough flags accrue, action will be taken, either automatically or by moderator intervention.

In order to maintain our community, moderators reserve the right to remove any content and any user account for any reason at any time. Moderators do not preview new posts in any way; the moderators and site operators take no responsibility for any content posted by the community.

Always Be Civil

Nothing sabotages a healthy conversation like rudeness:

  • Be civil. Don’t post anything that a reasonable person would consider offensive, abusive, or hate speech.
  • Keep it clean. Don’t post anything obscene or sexually explicit.
  • Respect each other. Don’t harass or grief anyone, impersonate people, or expose their private information.
  • Respect our forum. Don’t post spam or otherwise vandalize the forum.

These are not concrete terms with precise definitions — avoid even the appearance of any of these things. If you’re unsure, ask yourself how you would feel if your post was featured on the front page of the New York Times.

This is a public forum, and search engines index these discussions. Keep the language, links, and images safe for family and friends.

Keep It Tidy

Make the effort to put things in the right place, so that we can spend more time discussing and less cleaning up. So:

  • Don’t start a topic in the wrong category.
  • Don’t cross-post the same thing in multiple topics.
  • Don’t post no-content replies.
  • Don’t divert a topic by changing it midstream.
  • Don’t sign your posts — every post has your profile information attached to it.

Rather than posting “+1” or “Agreed”, use the Like button. Rather than taking an existing topic in a radically different direction, use Reply as a Linked Topic.

Post Only Your Own Stuff

You may not post anything digital that belongs to someone else without permission. You may not post descriptions of, links to, or methods for stealing someone’s intellectual property (software, video, audio, images), or for breaking any other law.

Powered by You

This site is operated by your friendly local staff and you, the community. If you have any further questions about how things should work here, open a new topic in the meta category and let’s discuss! If there’s a critical or urgent issue that can’t be handled by a meta topic or flag, contact us via the staff page.

Disclaimer

Any opinions, statements (including statements about LSST and what it will deliver), or recommendations expressed on this forum are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the LSST Project.

Terms of Service

We have a Terms of Service describing your (and our) behavior and rights related to content, privacy, and laws. To use this service, you must agree to abide by our TOS.