Sandbox / Suspension

Early draft stage with little confidence if everything is correct.

Activity on this website (or any other) is a privilege that has been granted, not a right that you are entitled to. Making an account here means agreeing to the site's terms and conditions. Your privileges remain under the assumption that you know and agree to follow website policies. While finding those rules may be difficult at first, "ignorance of the law is no excuse", and the user should Read the Freaking Manual at the first opportunity. Any privilege may be revoked at any time if it becomes apparent that the user creates trouble to the site or other users, intentionally or not.

Suspension (Internally called Restrain) is a moderator action to remove a troper's privilege to interact with certain functions of the website. Suspensions are issued when it's believed the troper continuously disrupts the workflow of the site, especially after being told about it. Suspended users can be released if they convince the moderators that the problem will no longer occur. Having a prior suspension usually makes mods skeptical at trusting the user, even they were issued for different reasons.

Ban is a suspension that is permanent and is no longer negotiable.

Thump is a moderator action in the TV Tropes Forum, which hides a post's text from non-mods and sends the user a private message about the hidden post. Thumps are tracked by the moderation team and collecting multiples can result in a forum suspension.

The Administrivia index contains the website's policies. The forum rules are listed here. Subforums often have specific rules pinned in a thread, and individual forum threads may have specific rules that aren't clearly stated. TV Tropes Glossary covers certain terms and website etiquette that are not covered elsewhere.

Most rules are derivatives of the site's Rule #1: "Don't be a dick".

Almost all suspensions are based on violating one or more of the rules mentioned in the previous two paragraphs.

See What to Do If You Are Suspended if you have been issued a suspension.

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Suspension types

• Wiki (Also known as Edit Banned): Blocks users from editing the wiki, uploading/editing videos, using discussion pages, uploading images (wikiside). As a side-effect, it also blocks TLP launches.
• PM: Blocks users from sending Private Messages and Notifiers.
• Posting: Blocks users from posting forum-wide (except in the Edit Banned and Get Help With English threads), posting on discussion pages, and due to a bug, TLP comments. This will also block voting on crowners and profile management functions, like editing signatures and avatars.
• TLP: Blocks users from creating, viewing, editing, commenting on, and hatting/bombing on TLP drafts.
• Query: Blocks users from posting on Ask The Tropers, Trope Finder, You Know That Show, Query Wishlist, and Query Bugs.
• OTC: Blocks users from posting on the On-Topic Conversation subforum.
• Workshops: Blocks users from posting on Trope Repair Shop and Image Pickin' subforums.
• Video Uploading: Blocks users from video uploading and editing.
• P5: Blocks users from posting on the Content Violations subforum.
• Reviews: Blocks users from posting work page reviews and commenting on other users' reviews.
• Liveblog: Blocks users from posting and commenting on Live Blogginations.
• Forum topic blocks: Blocks users from posting on a specific subforums. Each subforum has its own specific block. These blocks are sometimes paired with another suspension like Liveblog because forum topic blocks don't give troper's access to the Edit Banned thread (the place where ban appeals go) like regular suspension blocks do.
• Bounce: This block sets the site to read-only, disabling all functions.

Forum thumps

• thump: "This post has been thumped with the mod stick. This means knock it off."
• bait: "Thumped for taking troll bait. Feeding a troll. Bad idea."
• civil: "Wow. That was rude. Too many of this kind of thump will bring a suspension. Please keep it civil."
• numbskull: "This post was thumped by moderation to preserve the dignity of the author."
• offtopic: "This post was thumped by the Stick of Off-Topic Thumping. Stay on topic, please."
• personal: "Thumped for switching the discussion from the topic to a person."
• rules: "Please see The Rules. This is a warning that this post is the sort of thing that will get you suspended."
• strawdog: "Extreme positions taken just for the lulz do not work here."

General, but not all, grounds for suspension, or at least for a reminder

• Violations of the Administrivia policies.
  • Edit War warrants an immediate suspension when discovered without a heads-up.
• Violations of the Forum Rules.
  • Repeatedly receiving forum thumps.
• Editing malpractice covered by Notifiers.
  • Especially a malpractice after receiving a respective notifier, or warranting multiple types of notifiers in quick succession.
  • Generally poor English grammar on the wiki. Checker plugins mainly help with the word spelling, not with the proper sentence writing.
• Wiki vandalism.
  • Blanking a page instead of using the Cut List.
  • Using a Cut List without a good reasoning.
  • Leaving scripts or text replacement plugins/extensions enabled during editing and leaving unintended edits.
  • Intentional misinformation of the work's content.
  • Improper use of the Custom Title tool.
• High and mighty tone.
  • Disregarding a mod message in red background (the "hat on" mode) or "MOD NOTICE" in wiki's comment markup or queries.
  • Rudeness or aggression at any part of the site.
  • Personal attacks and switching to arguments against a troper.
  • Using edit reasons for arguments for edits instead of any other suitable option to discuss these arguments before editing.
  • Arguing against The Goals of TV Tropes.
  • Continuing own position against a consensus or acting without/disregarding one when it was required.
  • Page or TLP draft ownership. Especially for own works.
  • Political or personal agenda, Single-Issue Wonk, hate speech, promoting strong viewpoint, "fixing" writing to own beliefs, and Drama Importation.
  • Mini-modding, intimidating a troper with a mod action or treating own statements as a rule enforcement despite not being a mod.
  • Using own or another's edit history as an argument for someone's value to the wiki.
  • Using own health as an excuse for repeated misbehavior or as a threat.
• Spam and multi-posting on any parts of the site.
  • Serial Tweaker is not an offense, but repeatedly fixing own edits instead of using the Preview button is.
  • Using the site as a recruitment or advertisement platform for something unrelated to the site and Drama Exportation.
• Ban-evasion, sockpuppeting, meatpuppeting, and assisting in ban-evasion.
• Failing to notice trope's placement in special indexes like No Real Life Examples, Please! and No Recent Examples, Please!, or special conditions mentioned in the trope description like Complete Monster, Magnificent Bastard Content Leak, Characterization Tags or Getting Crap Past the Radar.
• Having more than one active account without telling a moderator beforehand to lock the old one and connect activities.
• Posting content illegal by U.S. laws.
• Since TV Tropes staff are not equipped to handle such a situation, credible claims of having suicidal ideation will result in your account being suspended until you can provide evidence that you have received appropriate mental health care.

Q&A

How to report problematic behavior / rule violations?

It is better to resolve such issues privately when possible. In most, though not all cases, explaining to the troper what have they done wrong is enough for them to correct themselves. Otherwise...

For forum issues use Holler button near an rule-breaking post or own post and describe what requires a mod's attention. For wiki issues use Ask The Tropers and provide links to edits in question from page histories (old edits may require adding "&more=t" to the link). Ask The Tropers can also be used to bring up any other problems.

How to request a troper to be suspended?

You don't. A moderator has to check if the issue with the troper may be recurring or urgent, and that there's a rule violation in the first place. Even if it's a clear case, the decision to suspend is up to the mod team and not up to regular tropers.

Can someone edit on behalf of a suspended user?

No. Even if a suspended user doesn't specifically request it, they are not allowed to edit and the wiki cannot be edited in their interest. This will result in the suspended user getting a permanent ban or a bounce for ban-evasion and the involved troper getting in trouble as well. If a suspended user asks anyone for a favor, politely dismiss them and remind them that they should discuss it with the mod team. The exceptions are Get Help With English Here and Is this an example? threads; if there are no problems with proposed edits, they can be carried on behalf of a suspended user.

Why edits made by a ban-evader can't stay?

Being bounced means that the user is no longer allowed to edit the site in any way. Adding a lot of good quality examples doesn't give a pass on rule-breaking. If they somehow continue to edit, all of their edits except for grammar and technical corrections need to be undone. If we keep edits from suspended tropers, banning them in the first place would become meaningless. If an example is valid, it can be rephrased or brought it up to the Ban-Evader Reversion Thread.

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