Tips for running your group

Ultimately it is the Admins that decide what the rules are for their group, but if you have been made an admin of a Flickr group, here are some suggestions for keeping your group happy:

Admin Guidelines

If you are the administrator of a group, here are some pointers for creating a thriving community:

1. Invite your friends and anyone you know who is interested in what you are interested in. Having group members is the first step in having a successful group!
    
2. Visit the group frequently. Groups thrive with daily discussion, and with daily responses from other members of the community, in chat and on the discussion boards.
    
3. Moderate, moderate, moderate! Successful groups are kept in check by good moderation. Tend that garden; pull the weeds, mow the lawn, prune the roses, etc. To help you moderate your group, you can enlist other members to become moderators. Moderators don't have full administrative power, but they can help you moderate pool submissions, keep tabs on discussions, and weed out the people who don't play by the rules.
    

Removing and Banning. Here are some general guidelines to help Admins determine how and when to use the Removing and Banning Features.

“Removing” is when a person is removed from a group. They can come back if they want, but some trolls just need a cooling off period and are remorseful when they return.

“Banning” is for the unremorseful trolls who continue to be obnoxious. It means they cannot join the group, or the channel and are banished.

• Use this power wisely and sparingly.
• If a troll types or posts something offensive, they should be warned.
• If they continue their behavior, they should be removed. You can do this from the Admin view of the members list.
• If they come back and continue their behavior they should be banned. You can do this from the Admin view of the members list.
• Use your best judgement. Sometimes when someone is banned they go and create a new account using another name and rejoin the group. This is fine so long as they don’t continue the prior behavior. Permit them to be someone else. However, if they continue the behavior that got them removed in the first place, it's OK to ban them.

Group Life

Swearing. People ask if it’s OK to swear. It is OK to swear so long as you’re not offending, insulting or harassing anybody.

Porn. Porn, nudity and other such content is not disallowed on Flickr, but it shouldn’t be posted in public areas. (Here's a link to the more general Community Guidelines.)

Trolls. Trolls are people who are just being rude and obnoxious, and are generally trying to offend, shock, harass, abuse or otherwise annoy people. Dealing with such people can often be difficult, but they should not go unwarned, unremoved or unbanned. Trolls can destroy a community, and often this is their goal.

Trolls thrive on attention, and often the best way to deal with them is to completely ignore them. They don't know when they are being ignored, all they know is that no one is responding to their attempts to annoy, harass or offend.

If you find someone annoying or offensive, you can block them. You can always un-block someone if you change your mind later.

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