APHA Members Connect! Forum Guidelines and Terms of Service
We have only a few rules, all intended to keep the conversation useful, civil, and professional.
We want you to get to know each other, learn, and have fun, within these guidelines.
Violations may result in your being removed from the APHA Connect! Discussion Forum. In extreme cases, a violation can result in being removed from APHA membership.
Further, forum moderators reserve the right to remove any post at any time whether or not it violates one of these specific guidelines.
- Be polite and respectful. You may not always agree, but you can disagree politely. No name calling, no foul language, no bullying. No politics nor religion are to be discussed unless they are obviously germane to the advocacy-related conversation.
- Please do not post a link to a news story or other online material without adding at least a few sentences explaining why you think it will be of interest to other members. Without that extra information, we will become no more than a link farm. If you post only a headline, it will be removed (unless someone comments before it can be removed.) If you post only a link, your post will be removed (unless someone comments before it can be removed.)
- Similar to #2 above, please do not repost your own blog posts or newsletters, or links to your own blog posts or newsletters, without making sure there is something of bigger interest than just the fact that you’ve published it, and without an explanation as to why you are highlighting it. For example, just linking to a copy of your blog or newsletter online is NOT OK. But if you have written a blog post or newsletter that you think might be of particular interest to our general group of advocates, then go ahead and post a few sentences on why you think it is of particular interest, then link to it elsewhere.
- Any material posted that belongs to someone else (text, images, or other material) must be posted with attribution, citing the name and a link (where possible) to where it came from. The point is to give credit where credit is due. (APHA Members Connect will not host plagiarism of any magnitude.)
Acceptable attributions include:- A mention of the source with a link to that source.
- Photo © Joe Blog Poster
- Copyright Janet P. Advocate
- Or learn about Creative Commons attributions.
- No spam, including any non-advocacy related information. Spamming includes promotion of products or services that are inappropriate to this Forum. Promotion is acceptable if it is appropriate to the current discussion or relates directly to advocacy. (Examples – you may not promote sale of your office furniture or your daughter’s Girl Scout cookies, but you may post about an advocacy course you took, or a vendor who helped you build your website. You may also post information about an advocacy-related resource you have developed yourself, or even a link to your newsletter – see above.)
- No advocate requests may be posted in general access forums*. (example: “I need to find someone who can _ fill in the blank _.”) All members of APHA share these APHA general membership forums, but not all are prepared to help patients, nor do all have liability insurance coverage to do so. This restriction exists to protect you and to protect APHA from potential liability problems. If we find a request for direct-to-patient help in any general forum, it will be removed.
If you need to find assistance from another advocate, please post your request in the +ADL Forum (only Directory-Listed members have access) or look instead in the AdvoConnection Directory or on the APHA Membership website (Find the Expertise You Need).
*General access forums are those which any level membership level may access; that is all forums except the +ADL Forum which is limited to only Premium +ADL (AdvoConnection Directory Listed) members, or any of the cohort-only forums reserved for Academy groups (example: 100 Days to Launch).
Questions? Or problems to report? info@aphadvocates.org Please be sure to send us a link to the problem post.