Forum Rules-Preview for Guests
In order to become a registered member of the Caught-The-Skunk.com website, you must first agree to abide by Caught-The-Skunk, L.L.C.’s Agreement-Terms of Use and Supplemental Forum Rules (listed below).
Caught-The-Skunk, L.L.C. supports a courteous and fair social environment for our membership, so that inappropriate behavior is not only controlled but eliminated. Our Administrators and Moderators will make every attempt to keep all objectionable messages off this forum, but it is impossible for us to review all messages. As a result, we ask that our membership get involved by notifying us of potential violations which are disruptive to the forum(s). The # 1 rule here is to use “COMMON SENSE.”
If you do not follow the rules of engagement, disciplinary action in regards to your membership with Caught-The-Skunk.com may be initiated, up to and including termination.
Supplemental Forum Rules
1) Conduct yourself in a manner which is courteous and respectful to other members’ opinions, even though you may sometimes disagree with them.
2) Disrespectful comments concerning other websites and/or forums (of similar nature) and vendors/sponsors is not permitted.
3) Constructive criticism is allowed but should not morph into a conversation which becomes unconstructive or confrontational with other members. In other words, do not “feed the fire.” Debate is encouraged but personal attacks are not.
4) If you have a problem with another member, we ask that you work things out amongst yourselves via Private Message or just ignore them until the problem resolves itself. If it does not, intervention by an Administrator or Moderator may be required.
5) If you don’t care to partake in another forum member’s comments or opinions, you should take advantage of the settings in your Control Panel and set him or her to your Ignore List.
6) When reporting your fishing or crabbing trip reports, stick to a general location/area and leave out any specific GPS coordinates.
7) Keep the conversation on topic. Do not hijack a thread (or post) and send it off onto another subject area. The website has been constructed to provide ample separation of topics through multiple forums. The Administrator and/or Moderator will do their best to redirect off-topic threads to the appropriate forum as necessary.
8) English is the official language of Caught-The-Skunk.com.
9) Foul language is not permitted. If you happen to see “******” it indicates that the vBulletin Administrative Control Panel has been activated and the language filter has censored the word as being inappropriate.
10) Shouting (via CAPITALIZATION) may be appropriate in certain instances but should not become habitual.
11) Keep “bumping” of threads to a minimum.
12) SPAM of any form is not permitted. Commercial advertising is limited to pre-paid banner/button/text ads placed on pre-determined areas of the website’s pages.
13) An Administrator or Moderator’s decision if final and without appeal. The old adage of “3 strikes and you’re out” applies. Just like your driver’s license, warnings are only a courtesy to you, giving you ample time to self-correct your behavior i.e., before you possibly lose your membership privileges. Therefore, make sure you do not get to that point in the first place. We’re all here to have fun.
14) One-on-One, personal conversations should be done via the Private Messaging system and not necessarily on one of the forums. The general rule is to keep private messages private, unless both parties agree to make it public.
15) If at any time, you feel that a post is inappropriate for a designated forum, please click on the red triangle in the upper right-hand corner of the thread and report it to the Administrator or Moderator.
16) Your forum Control Panel has been pre-set by the Administrator and modifications cannot be enacted beyond their current functional settings. A generous amount of space has been appropriated to your profile so that pictures may be uploaded and shared with others.
17) Posts and/or photos containing embedded advertisements or links/hyperlinks to competitor websites and/or businesses (e.g., fishing discussion forums/boards) are not allowed. The exception to this rule would be a member who also has a paid advertisement running as a banner/button/text ad within one of the designated areas of the website. Members interested in advertising should go to the "Advertising Opportunities," located in the Site Navigation Map on the left-hand side of each website page.
18) The Classified Marketplace is reserved for membership. In order to post a particular item, you must physically own it. The forums’ intent is to function as a “yard sale” for website members.
This is not intended to be an all-inclusive list but rather a general set of rules to abide by when participating in the Skunk's Lair.
Classified Ad Rules for Registered Members
The function of the Caught-The-Skunk.com Classified Ads marketplace is pretty simple, i.e., "to provide our members with the opportunity to buy, sell or list PERSONAL, NON-COMMERCIAL items.” Below are some General Rules to abide by when participating in these particular forums:
1) Commercial Listings are PROHIBITED.
2) Ads linked/hyper-linked outside of Caught-The-Skunk.com are PROHIBITED.
3) The content of your post should facilitate interest about the item(s).
4) Adequate contact information should be provided along with the ad. Reason being is that the Classified Ads' forums have been set-up to prevent online conversations about the item.
5) If you become interested in an item listed, please direct your correspondence to the listing member via private message (available in your User Control Panel) or offline via telephone, texting, e-mail, or other contact method.
6) Once the transaction has been completed (or some other action taken), we ask that the member return to their listing and enter a status reply, thereby informing our membership that a particular item has been “SOLD,” “REMOVED FROM SALE,” or some other applicable statement.
If you do not follow the rules of engagement, disciplinary action in regards to your membership with Caught-The-Skunk.com may be initiated, up to and including termination.
Best of luck.
