TOPICS DISCUSSED on this thread:

No trolling!
Rationale for all rules. Do not put PK shippers on the defensive.
Site-Wide Rules
Forum Rules
Forum Signature and Avatar rules
Forum Restrictions on Private Messaging (PM); Email; Replying to / Reading Topics in Certain Sections
Expected Response Time for concerns brought to PK staff's attention



RELATED TOPICS:
Policies & FAQs for Portkey Fanfic Archive
Policies & FAQs for Portkey Fanfic Recommendations Engine (Rec-Engine)
FAQs for Fanart Gallery
Policies for Privacy, Copyright and other legalese



No Trolling!
(i.e., making posts designed to antagonise other Members or to nag them about their PK ships):
This rule, like the others, stem from basic courtesy. We're spelling it out it now since some members tend to ignore or be unaware of it. ~gal-texter


This is a Shipping Forum, and it is for fellow Shippers to share the love. Shippers will talk of many things close to their heart ranging from the sublime to the ridiculous.

Shippers are here to sail their Ship in peace. The last thing Members want when they visit their favourite Ship Forum is to have someone suddenly come in expecting them to not only explain why they chose their Ship, but to also justify their opinion.

So posts that contain comments designed to provoke heated debate, such as "How is this proof of a future romantic relationship between so and so?", "Where is the evidence?" and "Your Ship is sooo not gonna happen! Wake up to yourselves!" are quite unwelcome at Portkey. Here is a shining example of how not to behave here. Such posts will be removed and action taken against the Member in question.

If Members genuinely want to RESPECTFULLY the merits (or lack of) PK's ships, please head on over to places like the Semi-Debates Forum.

One important thing to note: If a Member sees a post of this nature, remember this, Do not feed the Trolls. Rather than reply to the post, report the post to a Mod and let them handle it.


May 2008: did minor rephrasings ~gal-texter, co-admin
*waving to ex-co-mod Anazecria*

This post was edited and displayed publicly from July 20, 2008.
Refer to the Fandom Glossary for any unfamiliar words.


Background:

Portkey.org was founded in 2002 to provide an online home and sanctuary for fans of the Harry/Hermione (H/H) pairing from the Harry Potter stories. Over the years, we have opened our doors to fans of the following ships:

-- Lily/James (L/J)
-- Draco/Ginny (D/G)
-- Ron/Luna (R/LL)

We've never wavered from our above-stated goal. We've been supporting our ships by archiving fanfiction and fanart about them, hosting competitions and exchanging recommendations for those creative endeavors, and maintaining a forum to discuss anything imaginable about the ships.

We've been allowing any Potter fan to join our site for as long as they remain respectful of our target audience's shipping views. We're also aware that Portkey users come from diverse backgrounds in terms of cultures, countries, languages, age groups, gender/sexual orientation, education and occupations. Also, we must be considerate of differences in our members' internet facilities and familiarity with online lingo and customs.

To maintain (some) order, we require all Portkey.org users to abide by the site's rules at all times. All users must keep in mind that we can change our rules without prior notice and that our moderators can delete anything that violates our rules.

This post was edited and displayed publicly from July 20, 2008.
Refer to the Fandom Glossary for any unfamiliar words.


Allow me to spotlight something that had led to much misunderstanding and dissatisfaction in the last couple of years and months: putting Portkey shippers on the defensive.

We have always clearly identified Portkey.org as a shipping site primarily for H/H. Most of our members come here to talk with shipmates about anything remotely connected to our ships, including our thrills, frustrations, rumors, speculations and opinions about scenes from the books, movies and fan-made material, without need to justify our choice of HP pairings.

Many visitors don't realize it but much of that fun can be wiped out by questioning PK shippers' preferences. Comments like the following usually come across as impolite and tiresome, especially when done in the shippy discussion boards:

-- I don't get it. Why do you ship Harry/Hermione when JKR wrote R/Hr and H/G in the books?
-- I don't see anything in the books that support your ship.
-- Why do you guys care so much about the books?
-- I don't see any chemistry in the movie scenes or photos with Harry and Hermione, Draco and Ginny or Ron and Luna.
-- I don't share your shipping preferences. Give me canon evidence to support your liking for your ships, and dislike of the books.


If you like another pairing and are genuinely curious as to why we like our ships, then read -- but don't rebut-- the discussions here for H/H, here for D/G, here for R/LL, and here for L/J. You can also read the archived debate threads and rebut them in ongoing semi-debates.

If after doing the above, you still feel compelled to rebut most everything PK shippers say outside our semi-debates forum, then I urge you to leave the site. It's a matter of etiquette and common sense. When you go to a store that clearly markets itself as pro-Harry/Hermione, what can you expect to see inside? Of course you'd see its patrons raving about this H/H picture or artwork or that H/H fiction, or ranting about how much they disliked an H/G picture or an R/H scene! Would you walk up to them to tell them off? Is it something you'd like to be done to you? Is it worth your time to do so?

As a side note, we've noticed that only a handful of people have deliberately antagonized PK shippers, and majority of them have already been banned by the mod team. Most members who are "opposing shippers" or "non-shippers" have sometimes said things along the lines of my examples above, but they have since observed the limits set by the mods.

Refer to the Fandom Glossary for any unfamiliar words.

We would've preferred that either of Portkey's co-founders post these updated rules, but their real lives keep getting in the way. This new set of rules retain many of the principles or rationales behind the older ones.


Portkey.org Site-Wide Rules


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REMINDERS:

Portkey's Moderating Team (mod team)

Our mod team's decisions are final. But normally, our mods are receptive to questions about their decisions, for as long as those questions are worded courteously. Members may also PM or email the site's admins for concerns about a moderator's decision. The admins normally consult the moderator about such complaints.


Punishment for violating Portkey's rules

Note that moderators usually make notes on your account for every offense. Those notes are permanently saved on your accounts and can be accessed anytime by the incumbent mods.

We encourage everyone to use the "Report" buttons available on forum posts and uploaded fanfiction chapters. Our mod team have meted and will mete out punishments commensurate to the severity of the offense or to the offender's track record or responses. These penalties may range from merely deleting the offending items to suspending account privileges temporarily or permanently. Yes, we're perfectly aware that users may register under another alias, but this applies to them:




We FORBID the following anywhere in Portkey.org,
be it in the forums, fanfiction archive, fanart gallery, IRC chat channel and any other facility that we might revive or put up in the future.
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• Using Portkey's sections for purposes other than what the mod team had intended it for.
  
  This includes uploading anything other than fanfiction TEXT in our fanfiction archive, OR posting anything other than Harry Potter fanart in our fanart gallery. Users should not abuse the fanfiction section's "bio" field. We don't mind our writers from posting thank you notes and updates about the story's status. We allow author's notes to embed URLs to related image or media files.
  
  We forbid them from posting rants, essays, unrelated text (such as idiots' guides to writing) or advertisements or from displaying image / media files (art, banners, pictures, video, screen for audio) in our fanfiction section. Most of those are better off posted in our forums (at talk.portkey.org). Some media files may not be objectionable per se, but they have been abused by quite a few people. We'd rather that our mods spend their time on more productive tasks than to monitor abusive uses. As for advertisements, please scroll below for our advertising policy.
  
  
  The moderating team may occasionally upload test stories, artwork or messages to test the site's technical features.
  
  
• Posting material that do not conform with our hosting criteria for that particular section.
  
  All stories, fanart or recommendations posted in their respective Portkey sections must conform with our following policies for our:
  
  -- Fanfic Archive (fanfiction.portkey.org)
  -- and Fic Recommendations Engine aka Rec-Engine (recs.portkey.org).
  
  We've yet to find time to formalize our fanart hosting policy, but it generally follows the spirit of our fanfic policies.
  
  
• Rude or insulting remarks:
  
  Rude comments referring to Portkey's authors, artists and other users would be deleted without warning and are considered severe offenses.
  
  Examples:
  "It's comments like these that are so far removed from reality ... This thread is full of similar idiocy."
  "I find [your fic challenge] as sad, unimaginative and totally boring. ..."
  "Next time when you want to post an challenge, think about it twice. And post only if you have an GOOD challenge."
  
  The above quotes were lifted from two members' posts. They've already been banned from the site.
  
  
• Spam
  
  We define this as posts of a pointless or repetitive nature, or posts that do not have any relevance to the topic at hand.
  
  
• Bashing
  
  We define bashing to mean "severely attacking someone's character without justification and/or using offensive wording". Here are examples of what are and are not considered to be bashing:
  
  Comments that would usually be considered bashing:
  "JKR's a bitch!"
  "H/G shippers are shallow."
  
  
  Comments that would not usually be considered bashing:
  "After Books 6 and 7, I've lost faith in JKR writing abilities."
  "The H/G ship is shallow compared to H/H because [... justification]"
  
  
  
• Illegal Activities:
  
  We do not condone illegal activities. The latter phrase includes, but is not limited to, the sharing of URLs where files may be downloaded in violation of the law. Portkey members are forbidden from abetting such.
  
  
• Impersonating another member:
  
  Impersonating another member is forbidden. This extends to hacking of other users' accounts, stealing of passwords, or signing up with similar usernames in an attempt to fool other users.
  
  
• Copying or discussing Portkey members' opinions without permission
  Our copyright policy elaborates on this.
  
  
• Netspeak
  
  To minimize miscommunication, please do not use netspeak or SMS speak on the site. Near-mainstream words such as "LOL", "ROFL" and 'Btw" are allowed, but not terms such as "ne 1" or "ne body".

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Other Site-Wide rules:

The site's mods or admins reserve the right to forbid any advertisements made by anyone at any time. The rules below cover advertising using any Portkey facility, including but not limited to forum posts, signatures, avatars, author's notes in stories posted in our fanfiction archive, artists' comments posted in our fanart galleries, reviews posted in our fanfiction or fanart sections, user's notes in their fanfiction account profiles, text on fanart images. our forums' Private Messaging and email systems.

The mod team will immediately delete any forum posts that contain little to no information about the website or online community being plugged. Our mods had done this to posts that contain only the other site's URL.
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• Advertising for Profit:
  italics = edited on Jul 22 2008
  
  Portkey users are forbidden from using Portkey's facilities to advertise websites or projects for profit. Only the mod team's members are exempted from this to serve as (inadequate) compensation for their work in Portkey. Current and former mods are naturally expected not to abuse this trust.
  
  
  
• Advertising sites that promote ships contradicting those supported by Portkey
  
  We generally forbid directly plugging this type of sites anywhere in Portkey. However, our registered authors and artists may link to their stories or artwork hosted in other sites. Our members may name these sites in their forum profiles' "Other Fandom Haunts" field. Fanfiction and fanart recommendations that meet our recommendations criteria may include stories or artwork that are archived in other sites.
  
  
• Advertising sites similar to any Portkey.org section:
  (reference for mods)
  
  In recent years, our moderating team has not objected to threads or posts purposely made to plug websites or online groups whose services/content are similar to Portkey's. In fact, since April or May 2008, we've created separate subforums where we've moved those threads for the H/H, L/J, D/G and R/LL ships.
  
  Please remember that this type of advertising is a privilege, not a right, that may be withdrawn anytime by our mod team for any reason. We particularly frown on cases where the user has not posted anything but advertisements here in Portkey.
  
  On a side note, we've also put redirect links to sites whose owners/maintainers have a long history of contributing to Portkey, by lending their artwork and/or donating money and/or working in our mod team. Some of those links lead to sites hosted by Portkey.
  
  Effective July 22 2008, we require that the staff (admins and mods) who plug their sites here, under this category, should reciprocate by plugging Portkey.org on their site, with equal prominence and frequency as their plugs in here. It's only fair.
  
  We've attached some graphics that other sites may use in their reciprocal plugging. Please link them to http://fanfiction.portkey.org.

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Click the following images to magnify them, if necessary. NAPPA had made both of them.

Click to view attachment Click to view attachment

Refer to the Fandom Glossary for any unfamiliar words.

We would've preferred that either of Portkey's co-founders post these updated rules, but their real lives keep getting in the way. This new set of rules retain many of the principles or rationales behind the older ones.


Portkey's Fanfiction Rules may be found here. They generally apply to our Fanart Gallery as well.

Here are Portkey.org's Forum Rules:

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• No displaying of images in forum posts.
  Give appropriate R or NC-17 warnings when linking to images.
  
  Images cannot be displayed in forum posts. This means we forbid the IMG code on forum posts. Exceptions would be made for
  - screenshots that demonstrate the use of Portkey's features or some Portkey troubleshooting questions and solutions;
  - graphics used to acknowledge the artists and sources who have contributed to our site's layouts;
  - pictures that Portkey staff deem worthy of displaying in or attaching to forum posts;
  - embeds of PG-13 videos, including trailers for the Harry Potter movies.
  
  
  This rule is quite simple to follow: members can simply edit their posts to replace the letters IMG with URL. After doing that, they might want to do step b in this post.
  
  We do allow members to post URLs (the one that starts with http://) of images of any rating, for as long as those files are relevant to the discussions AND appropriate warnings are given for images rated R or NC-17 or their equivalent.
  
  Rationale for these rules about images:
  
  -- The IMG code often causes hotlinking issues. Whenever people look (intentionally or not) at webpages that have this code, they consume that linked site's bandwidth which costs them money. This has been likened to stealing electricity from another house.
  -- Portkey members have different internet speeds. Displaying too many images will slow down loading of our site's webpages.
  -- Many big images distort our webpages' layout. However, while small images do not, it would be easier to apply these "no displaying of images" rule uniformly regardless of the image's size rather than for everyone to remember what dimensions would be considered too big.
  -- Some of our visitors are underage.
  -- Image-less pages are more office- or school-friendly.
  -- R or NC-17 warnings would benefit those of us whose computer screens can be seen by our coworkers, family members or other people.
  
  
• Content ratings for forum discussions:
  
  Members must be careful to use language within the PG-13 level, even when discussing adult-rated themes or material. That is, you can talk about R or NC-17 stories or other stuff, but use words that you'd utter around young children. When linking to adult-rated stories or art or other material, please include a warning about their ratings.
  
  (Our site's mod team might allow more graphic discussions in some areas of the site, but those exceptions will be clearly marked.)
  
  
• Relevance of posts:
  
  Members are expected to read each forum's description and guidelines, to ensure that they are posting in the correct section and thread. They should ask the forum Mod in Charge or inquire in the Forums Help Desk whenever they are unsure where to post.
  
  The mod team often moves dozens of posts or entire threads at a time to more appropriate sections. Members should read this pointer on how to find moved posts.
  
  Mods can delete, without warning, comments that hardly add anything to the discussion. These include posts that are comprised mostly of emoticons or contain very few words, or words that do not really contribute to the conversation at hand.
  
  "One-liners" (very short or hardly relevant replies) are generally frowned upon in Portkey. But the forum mods may relax this rule depending on the topic. "Games" sections, "HP Movies and Actors" and the "Muggle Lives" area are generally exempt from the "no one-liners" rule.
  
  
• Language:
  
  Most forum posts should be done in English, except in areas (such as these Quidditch World Cup (QWC) forums) that have been clearly marked as allowing other languages. We wouldn't object to members making posts or reviews in a foreign language when greeting their countrymen. It would be nice if they could post English translations for forum posts made outside the QWC.)

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Signature and avatar rules to follow!

Forum Signature and Avatar rules:
(Reference for mods)

GOALS:
-- to avoid insulting people
-- to direct more attention to replies to a forum topics
-- to save on bandwidth
-- to prevent stretching the board's layout
-- to be considerate of users who have slower internet connections


These are revised rules for forum signatures and avatars. They should also follow our site-wide rules explained earlier on this thread, particularly our revised advertising policy explained here (scroll down).


SIGNATURES:
Sample Sig allowed
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• Total signature (text + any images) must fall within the following dimensions on a 1024 x 768-p screen, give or take a centimeter or two:
  
  ------ Height: 2 inches (around 5 centimeters) or 220 pixels, whichever is lower.
  ------ Width: around 6 inches (approx 15 centimeters) or 550 pixels, whichever is lower. It should not stretch our forum pages' width beyond a 1024x768 screen.
  ------ Above are based on how your signatures would appear on a thread page, not on your forum profile page.
  
  
• Images or video should be limited to 40 KB per sig.
  In Windows, to check the file size in KB, right-click on the image and select Properties.
  
  
• Graphics and text should be limited to PG-13 equivalent material. When in doubt, don't show them.
  
  
• Images or text shouldn't insult or provoke Portkey's ships or shippers. Mods will have the final say on what's considered insulting or provocative.
  
  
• Do NOT display images from sites that aren't expressly set up to be online albums. Also, kindly minimize the use of such online albums because they do have to make a profit too, you know! If they lose too much money from your use of their facilities, then they could be forced to lay-off people.

COMMON EDITS made by Mods: We often reduce font sizes, remove blank lines, remove paragraph breaks (ie., make several sentences or verses fit in a single line), and minimize codes like center, color, and quote. The quote tag requires additional screen space, while the center tag doesn't have to be put in every single line.


AVATARS:

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RELATED TOPIC: FAQs about PK avatars. You might have to go over the older posts on that thread too.
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• Maximum avatar file size: 10 KB for uploaded avatars, 25 KB for remotely-hosted avatars (ie, those posted in Photobucket, etc.) In Windows, to check the file size in KB, right-click on the image and select Properties.
  
  Maximum weight x height allowed: 120x100 pixels. If you need assistance in reducing an image, post a request here. We mods would try to assist you.
  
  EDIT Feb 2009: We've temp switched off remote hosting of avatars as many members have been a. ignoring the maximum file size allowed; or b. hotlinking to non-photo-sharing sites; t or c. have not taken down links to deleted albums or images, which wastes the host site's resources. Besides, this would mean less work for mods, which would free up their time to do more productive work that would benefit all PK-ers.
  
  
  
• Images and text should be limited to PG-13 equivalent material. When in doubt, don't show it.
  
  
• Images or text shouldn't insult or provoke Portkey's ships or shippers. Mods will have the final say on what's considered insulting or provocative.
  
  
• Do NOT display images from sites that aren't expressly set up to be online albums. Also, kindly minimize the use of such online albums because they do have to make a profit too, you know! If they lose too much money from your use of their facilities, then they could be forced to lay-off people.

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Mods may remove sigs or avatars that violate the above anytime without prior warning. After all, all members should familiarize themselves with the site rules.


ANTICIPATED QUESTIONS:

Q: Mods had edited sigs (to remove images, reduce font sizes, etc.) Is there a way for members to know the URLs for those?

Mods usually copy the sigs' orig codes onto something called the Member Warning System, which is visible only to the mods. We also use this system for other notes (favorable or unfavorable) about the member. Therefore, if you want that URL or sig code, then contact any of the mods so they could look it up in your account's notes.


Q: How come we were allowed to post more or bigger images before?

Actually, those weren't allowed under any of the old rules, although we concede that there were too few mods to enforce the rules circa HBP and DH's book releases. Thanks to those members who continued observing the rules nonetheless.


Q: How come these rules are stricter than in other sites?

Each site has its own factors to deal with. As of this writing, our forum posts are nearing 400,000 while our members run in the thousands. We also have plenty other content such as fanfiction and fanart as well as recs for both. We'd rather spend bandwidth, server space, modly attention and other resources on these content than on signatures and avatars.

EDITED Feb 21 2009: For instance, we'd rather spend site resources on these award graphics than on avatars or sig images.


Q: What about those inactive members whose sigs or avis break the rules?

We've been editing many sigs and avis, but of course this will take time. You're welcome to give us their user ID #s so that we could edit their accounts faster.


Q: How come some sig images or avis are no longer displayed despite conforming to the rules?

We do this sometimes for some oldbies who haven't logged in here for years, to conserve on resources. Most of the time, we simply change their sigs' IMG codes to URL. Then we copy their avatar's URL onto their sigs.

We often encounter oops, this photobucket image has been deleted messages. In that case, we disable the display of those images then copy the URLs onto the members' sigs.


EDIT JAN 11 2009

Q: I saw this really good graphic that I'd love to share with our shipmates! It's too big though (in H x W or in KB), but is there a way I can let our Portkey-mates know about it?

Sure. Use the URL instead of the IMG code. That is, link to that image or video, but don't display it here. Please limit your sigs and avatars to PG-13 images.


EDITS MAR 2009

Q: My signature doesn't get fully displayed in my forum posts, but does so in my forum profile.

A: We've installed a signature control in our board software. It would display only the portion of the sig that fits within the dimensions we've set. Hah!


Q: My HP avatar or sig's missing, but it's within the rules!

A: If you haven't logged in PK for a while (say, 6-12 months), then we might temp un-display your avatar or sig to save on server space and bandwidth. Most of the time, we save your images' original URLs on your sig or as notes (saved on the "warning logs") in your forum account. This means you may ask the mods for help in retrieving those image URLs. However, don't expect us to have done this for non-compliant items since you shouldn't have posted them in the first place.
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Forum Restrictions on Private Messaging (PM); Email; Replying to / Reading Topics in Certain Sections:


We've been forced to restrict these privileges after they've been repeatedly abused by trolls. Hit the quote boxes' arrows below to see incidents of such:






The forum admins enable these privileges depending on a number of factors, such as the member's joining date, number of posts and lack of trolling tendencies shown in the member's messages.

Limitations in our board software have disabled some privileges for Portkey oldbies. If you are one such PK oldbie* who hasn't been trolling, then please head over here. If you're a newbie in PK but an oldbie in SCQ, then read that too.

What to do if you get spammed and/or trolled through our PM or email system?

-- DO NOT reply to the emails! Replying will reveal your email address to the spammers/trolls.

-- Use the forums' "Manage Ignored Users", "PM Block List", and "Hide my email address from other members" option.

-- Notify the admins by posting here or PM'ing us. We would revoke the trolls/spammers' PM & email privileges for as long as there's strong evidence against them. It would help if you could temporarily change your forum account's password then PM** it to us, so that we could read the PM the spammer or troll has sent you.

**NEVER post your password on a public message!

Here's another common-sense matter, but something prompted me to bring this up.

Expected Time for the Mod Team's Responses
to members' PK-related concerns

We've recently inserted this on top of these Help Desk forums:

Please give the mods two weeks to reply about your issue. If you haven't gotten a response by then, hit the Report button on your original post. On the report form, write something like Just wanted to follow up on this. This would alert other mods who are available.

If you assume that Portkey mods log in here only on weekends (as they don't get paid for their work here), then 1 calendar week should be considered the equivalent of 1 "response day".

There's plenty of evidence in these Help Desk forums where Portkey staff have responded in a prompt and friendly manner. If you don't remember cases of such, then you haven't been in PK long enough; you likely weren't around when there was a good number of staff members around.

However, there's been a few cases of friction between the staff and non-mods due to misunderstanding over the following:
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• PK staff should be given reasonable time to deal with complaints, requests, and other issues.
  
  
• Mod Team members are spread across different CONTINENTS. Hence, a delay in response might actually be because it's bedtime or worktime for some of us.
  
  
• It's not as if PK staff can drop their Real Life commitments right away to attend to Portkey matters. All of the Portkey staff come here only on their volunteer time.
  
  
• PK staff often have to do a lot of reading and may have to privately contact the people involved.
  
  
• The Mod Team cannot be expected to read all stories, posts or reviews. There are simply too many of them.
  
  
• Many Portkey facilities were coded by our staff as volunteer projects.
  Hence it's understandable if they lack time to debug their work or to install better versions. Debugging or improving an imperfect feature can take hours, days or much longer.
  
  
• Mods might be handling other PK tasks by the time they hear about your issue.
  
  
• Portkey admins would never demand business-like service levels from PK staff.

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We do appreciate it when people bring issues to our attention, but I personally get irked when people use berating, accusing or snarky tones. In my personal view, if you use impolite and obnoxious language in your complaint, then don't expect anyone here to respond to you. You cannot get away with that even in the real world where you pay people for their services, so don't expect to get away with it here in our fansite where nobody gets paid for their work here. Portkey staff have a long history of assisting current or prospective members with their concerns (which have included improving shortcomings that our members have politely pointed out to us), but we would not tolerate snarkiness.

Tell us mods about issues through the channels we've listed here in the Help Desk; give us enough time to deal with it; follow it up if you haven't seen us replying after a while. In most cases, the Mod Team immediately does something behind the scenes and goes beyond what could be expected of them.

Because of the above bulleted reasons, I personally do NOT recommend PM-ing or emailing mods for urgent issues. They might be sneaking back to work or school or home chores by the time you've sent them your PM or email.

We admins don't want mods to sacrifice things they enjoy (like watching their favorite sport or writing their fanfic) simply to respond asap. If we require that from our mods, they'd be bound to burn out sooner or later which would hurt PK in the long run.