Elftowner manual

General Rules

These are the general rules for what images you can upload to Elftown and display in your house.

G-1. All images in your house must have something to do with you.
Examples of images that have something to do with you are photos and drawings made by you, photos of you, photos of your pets or things that you own and drawings made for you by a friend. 

Examples of images that aren't allowed under this rule are images of cars, funny animals and other random images copied from the internet.

G-2. Images in your house must be made by you or for you.
Wiki banners and images from Elftown Graphics are allowed as long as they follow the rules, since they are made for all Elftown members.

Other art by fellow Elftown members is also allowed as long as:
- you have their permission
- it was entirely created by them
- you don't claim the art as your own
- it is not animated

Images from other sites are not allowed even if they are "free". Note that:
- Taking an image and editing it does not make it your own. This includes, but is not limited to, photomanipulations.
- Dollz and similar "assembled" images are not considered to be "made by you".

Please see Copying vs fanart & referencing on images you've created based on other material. You might need to include credits.

G-3. Pornographic images and images depicting extreme violence are not allowed in your house. Almost nude and nude images of minors and pictures of self mutilation are not allowed anywhere on Elftown.
Non-pornographic nudity is allowed provided no minors are involved. Elftown is a site for all ages, so keep it tasteful. You can request Artistic Nudity Warnings if you want to post nudity in your house.
Note: "Nudity" is defined as displayed genitals or a female breast where you can see the nipple. Extremely sexually suggestive looking photos are also considered "nude" even if there is no actual nudity shown in the image. So no showing of breasts before you're 18 in the photo!
Note 2: The "nudity of minor"-rule is demanded by (a pretty badly defined Swedish) law, and it doesn't matter if Elftown thinks the image is "harmless" or "artistic". 

G-4. Images that contain other images that break the rules are not allowed in your house.
For example, a collage or a wiki banner containing images that aren't made by you or for you aren't allowed.

G-5. No random copied writings in (descriptions of) houses.
Writing not your own is not allowed, unless someone wrote it especially for you (a friend).
Example: No copied stories, song-lyrics etc
Short quotes, or the likes, that don't exceed 4 phrases/lines/sentences are OK.
Copied questionnaires are allowed with a limit of 50 questions. Therefore choose your questions wisely.

Special Rules

These are categories of images that have special or more specific rules.

S-1. Animated images are not allowed in your house.
This includes animations donated to Elftown Graphics and animated wiki-banners.

The only exception to this rule is non-annoying animated images made by you. Something that makes you look for the delete button is annoying.

Animated images can be removed by the guards without warning.

S-2. Images of celebrities are not allowed in your house.
The only exception to this rule is if you are also in the photo.

Images of celebrities can be removed by the guards without warning.

S-3. Movie/Game screenshots are not allowed in your house.
The only exception to this rule is if you've created the art in it, like skins (Be sure to explain exactly what you have done though!).

S-4. Quiz images are not allowed.
Quiz result images can be removed by the guards without warning.

S-5. Fanart and other drawings that you have done using direct references from other images are only allowed if you have done the drawing.
We understand that this is how most artists practice and go on to discovering their own styles and we encourage growth.

Note: In some cases you are required to credit the original artist. Please see Copying vs fanart & referencing for further information on Elftown's policies for copying, fanart and referencing art.

S-6. Dollz, "me as a Southpark character" and similar "assembled" images are not allowed.
As stated under General Rule 2, "assembled" images like dollz are not considered "made by you" and are thus not allowed in your house.

S-7. You may only display one wiki banner for each wiki.
Don't put every wiki banner there is for a certain wiki in your house. Choose one you like best and use that. You may of course display wiki banners for several different wiki pages.

S-8. Mood images may not break any of the above mentioned rules.
Huge, animated or annoying mood images are not allowed.

You may only display one image in your mood and it has to be uploaded to the moods: you may not inline images in your mood.

S-9. ASCII images are not allowed in your house. (ASCII art)
Images consisting of the characters and symbols on your keyboard/computer that are considered copyrighted art or random images are not allowed.

If they are unique pieces created by you, then they are OK, and so are smaller less annoying things like
*)--->---( and the ordinary smileys.
It's the big annoying images that everyone has seen that we don't want.

Art on the Wiki

Images
The rules for images in your house don't all apply for the wiki. In the wiki you can inline animated GIFs and other free-to-use-images that you are not allowed to have in your houses.

However, you are NEVER allowed to steal art, that is, take someone else's picture and claim it as your own.

If it is a secret wiki-page (No link from your presentation or open forum), you can inline what you want.

Note: It's not allowed to use Elftown features, house or wiki, to upload material that doesn't belong to you. When you inline such material in the wiki or forum, use a different server to upload it to.

Wiki banners that break the rules aren't allowed in houses.
Follow the general rules written above if you don't want people to get in trouble for displaying your wiki banner in their houses. As the wikis owner or maintainer you will be held responsible if you encourage people to display wiki banners that break the rules.


Writings
Copying writings to a wiki is OK, as long as you don't claim the material (the wikiname shouldn't suggest it either).
If the owner requests for it to be removed, it will be done so.
Questionnaires longer than 50 questions can be put in wikis as well. See for example questionnaires.

How the Rules are Enforced

The Uploading Art Rules are enforced by us, the Town Guards. We can remove art that violates the rules and ban members who repeatedly upload or display art that violates the rules.

The Patrollers help us by finding and reporting art that is against the rules. This possibility is however not restricted only to Patrollers. In fact, everyone is encouraged to report rule violators.

If you find someone else violating the rules, please use the "send report to guards" button in that member's house and we will look into the matter. It is not possible for the Guards to keep an eye on each and every house and we certainly need your help in this. See the wiki page reports on how to write a good report.

Please do not send us messages saying we are unfair and we allowed someone to keep disputed material in their house. The rules apply to all. The only reason someone would still have copyrighted material displayed there is because no one has reported them yet. Do your part!

Sometimes we make mistakes and delete something that should have been allowed. Do not make a big deal about it. Reply to the guard who deleted your material (you got a message explaining why it was deleted) and explain briefly why it should be allowed and everything will be fine.

More on Copyright

First, a note on spelling. It's spelled "copyright", not "copywrite", and it's "copyrighted", not "copywritten". Copyright is about owning the right to copy something and controlling who is allowed to copy it. A copywriter is someone who works in advertising.

[Rondel] has written some lovely essays on:

Copyright and Intellectual Property
Copyright Alternatives and Copylefting
Copyright / Intellectual Property Links

Please read through these pages - they explain a great deal about copyrights.

Test Your Knowledge

Did you understand the Uploading Art Rules? Test your knowledge here:

UAR Test






How to make a report


In the member's house (presentation) you will see a "report this member to the guards" button right above the member name. Click on the button and write your report about that member in the text box.






Art theft reports


If you see a piece of art, a photograph, writing or such that you are sure (or even possibly doubt) doesn't belong to the member, please report the images to the guards. Read through the Uploading Art Rules to see what kind of images are allowed here or not.

Here's what makes the reports a little easier for us to handle:

- A good report contains as much information about the art as possible. So instead of saying "I've seen this image/writing before and so it is not hers!" if you provide a link to the original location of the image/writing, it is much nicer. Please do not use the img tag in the report, a simple link is fine.

- With regards to the images displayed in the bio, please do check the image location (right click and check the image properties). Just because Elftown does not host the images doesn't mean the images are stolen. Sometimes the members inline images from their own websites or free hosts like www.photobucket.com. If however the image is a random one (a funny cartoon for instance) please report the member.






Message Harassment reports


If you feel harassed by certain members on Elftown, please feel free to report them to the guards.However please note the following while making a report.

- Do not report a member for calling you names if you started that first. It is extremely childish to call the authorities because you could no longer handle an insult war that you started. In such a case, in all probability you would be the one being warned/facing a ban.

- Please do not contact us about real life problems that you have with certain members here. For example if some friend from real life and you decide to stop being friends, do not expect us to solve your problems.

- Please do not make reports on behalf of someone else. We want the harassed member to report, not some protective older brother or boyfriend to do it. Similarily, do not use a clone house (another account that you have here on ET) to make a report on someone because you do not wish that member to know who reported them. Your identity will never be given out to the reported member, you have all reasons to feel safe. (Note: Many reports are obvious who they come from, so we have to reveal your identity there. If after that you get a "You reported me, you bitch!" message, we'll ban the offender.)

- Do not make false reports. You are just wasting the guards' time by this and you will be warned and possibly banned if you continue to do so.

- It is a good idea to block someone who keeps sending you annoying messages. To do this go to the bottom of their presentation and click on the "block this member" button right below the message box (see How Do I Block Members for further information). Please do report the member too.

- If you received Chain messages, read the instructions about what to do then on given page.







Wiki reports


Report a member if they have been harassing you in wikis or have been messing up wiki pages intentionally. Please include the name of the wiki page (and the version number, if it has changed since then).





'Don't be an asshole!' is Elftown's number one rule. Aside from the various Uploading Art Rules, Elftown is very lax in controlling what you can and cannot do; it's a fun place to be. So why do people have trouble following this simple sentence, this primary guideline? Possibly they just feel like being annoying to everyone else. Or maybe they are just angry and need to vent. Better still, maybe they don't understand it. What does it mean to be an asshole?

An asshole is someone who disrupts the generally tranquil nature of a certain situation or place-more specifically Elftown in this case. This can be brought about by a countless number of things.

Here is a list of the most commonly observed things that could be used to label you as an 'asshole':

- Complete disrespect towards others
  = This means that you harass others because of some false claim, or for no reason at all.

- Destruction of other's work on purpose
  = This applies to all those that think that ruining someone's wiki-page is funny. It is easily fixed, but that doesn't make it right.

- Abuse of Elftown systems in a way others find offensive
  = For example, running around yelling at people to 'cyber' with you isn't the smartest thing you could do.

- Repetitive violations of the Uploading Art Rules
  = You may be upset when one of the Guards takes down your image because it is copyrighted, or random, and so on. However, putting it up again and again is just stupid.

- Repetitive sending of Chain messages
  = Chain messages explains what is considered a chain message; they are unwanted as they annoy people and quickly fill message boxes.

But, note:

- Not everyone is going to get along with everyone else.
  = Just because you hate someone doesn't mean that the Elftown guards consider that member an asshole. If you don't like someone for personal reasons, our tip is to not talk to that person. Starting a war on Elftown because someone has run over your dog will give you the bad title.

Knowing this, some people might ask the question, "Is being an asshole a bannable offense?". The answer is yes, being an asshole can get you banned, but we try to give members plenty of fair chances to change their ways. Just because you get angry once or twice does not mean that you will be banned. It all depends on the situation.

The Council believes that Elftown should be a fun place for everyone. To be a fun place, we need an environment free of hurtful people. So please, don't be an asshole. Oh, and have a nice day.

note: random chat is allowed on this wiki.
[Mortified Penguin] and [Sagacious Turkey] are not allowed to chat on this wiki