Member Photo Threads

[Buffy Summers]

Hi all 🙂

In light of recent events, and in the hope of keeping things as safe as possible here on the board, we have decided that threads of pictures of members will no longer be allowed on the board.

In doing some research and contacting professionals who deal with cases of internet "grooming", it's come to our attention that aside from the obvious, criminals can discover personal information and details about where you live from the items in the background of your photographs. Having these pictures in threads which are not only viewable by all members but by the internet at large just seems too risky. Some of you have posted a good number of pictures in these threads over the years, and it just seems like a bad idea to leave them out there.

I would like to caution everyone to guard not only personal information about yourself, but pictures of yourself. PLEASE be careful about sharing photos. Think very carefully about whether you want a profile picture that is of you (you'll notice, I do not). Especially for our underage members, I strongly encourage you to not use a picture of yourself.

And I would like everyone to please take a second to go to UserCp > Profile Privacy and review your privacy settings. At the very least, please change those settings to only viewable by registered members.

We will be posting more safety information soon, but for now, I hope you will all understand why we have decided to take this step.

 

[BuffyElevated]

Well this is kinda sad 'cause it's always fun to look at the 'Post a photo of yourself' threads, but I understand why you're doing this and I think it's a good idea. We all have Facebook, so we can see each other on there.

 

[Taake]

sad but totally understandable 😀 Saftey first!

 

[PrincessBuffy16]

I agree with Britt, I loved those Post a Photo of Yourself threads, but I understand why it's not alowed anymore 😉

 

[MinwaraYana]

Good idea. I've just done what you told. 🙂

 

[Foster]

That's a really good idea. It's sad that we have to do things like this to protect ourselves etc and not just say, hey what the hell, I trust people, but that's the way the world is unfortunately.

(Great, now I'm going to be stuck with serious thoughts all day!)

 

[Willow-Tree]

Question, what about signatures like what VH is doing now? Those are allowed, correct?

 

[Tasha]

Aww i suppose it's for the best,


yeah what about our Vh-ey trading card banners?

 

[Wesley]

It never occurred to me that non-members were reading my profile.

Any chance you can make the default profile settings to member only?

 

[Old Master 3.0]

Any chance you can make the default profile settings to member only?

Any of you can set your Profile settings. Simply go to your User CP and click "Profile Privacy", where you can set everything to "Registered Members" only. :: tu ::

 

[Lyri]

We've got photo threads in our House. Will they be going, or just the ones that are viewable by non-members? Seeing as how you need to be members to get access to houses, but maybe it would be safer if they were all deleted?

 

[white avenger]

No problem here. I always posted a picture of Ron Ely as Tarzan anyhow.

 

[Buffy Summers]

We've got photo threads in our House. Will they be going, or just the ones that are viewable by non-members? Seeing as how you need to be members to get access to houses, but maybe it would be safer if they were all deleted?

You will see that the Merrick photo threads are already gone. It will be a board-wide rule, because as we've seen, just because someone has registered and been sorted, it doesn't mean they are necessarily "safe".

It never occurred to me that non-members were reading my profile.

Any chance you can make the default profile settings to member only?

I actually misspoke in my post above - by default profiles cannot be viewed by non-members. However, it is a good idea for everyone to review these settings and think about who they want to allow to view what. Threads, however, (and the information displayed in them) can be viewed by non-members.

🙂

Question, what about signatures like what VH is doing now? Those are allowed, correct?

Only the threads of member pic after pic are completely disallowed. However, I want everyone to think carefully about what they put out there in signatures, threads, or whatever.

 

[Spike Angelus]

I changed everything so members only can view my profile info.
It's sad that this decision had to be made, but, with the type of world we live in, I completely understand.

 

[Angels baby101]

I gotta agree it is very sad that this has to happen because every one loves to see pictures of who their talking to to get a better idea of who they're talking to lol, but unfortunately not everyone is who they say they are and I agree that its a good idea and like it was stated above..Most members have things like Myspace, Facebook or tumblr where if they wanted to share pictures they could.

 

[Eleftheria]

Thanks Buffy for watching out our safety.🙂 I will check my profile privacy too.

 

[Christopher]

I think this is an overreaction, but understandable. What happened here that was so bad?

 

[Lyri]

What happened here that was so bad?

As one of the members more directly affected, and the fact that this has just now ceased to be an issue for me and others, let me just say that it concerned a now banned member and his...shall we say, criminal behavior. The Admin and mods felt it best that they control the privacy of the members as best they can, considering this is still the internet.

 

[Christopher]

As one of the members more directly affected, and the fact that this has just now ceased to be an issue for me and others, let me just say that it concerned a now banned member and his...shall we say, criminal behavior. The Admin and mods felt it best that they control the privacy of the members as best they can, considering this is still the internet.

Oh man, my interest is now piqued. Anywhere I can read an overview of the events?

If it were as serious as suggested I'd probably have done the same were I a mod.

 

[Mumrik]

Oh man, my interest is now piqued. Anywhere I can read an overview of the events?

If it were as serious as suggested I'd probably have done the same were I a mod.

This is a delicate issue to many members, which has already been dealt with and that we're trying to put behind us. If you don't know what happened, it doesn't need to concern you. Just trust there is a good reason and let it rest.