Policies
Comment policy
This is where we're supposed to tell you how to behave when you comment on our site. But we don't want to assume y'all don't know how to behave in civilized society. Because, come on, you don't need a "commenting policy" in life, right, so why do you need one here?
So, let's just start with this: Don't be a jerk, don't be boring, and don't be abusive to your fellow commenters or the author of the piece on which you're commenting. If you have an issue with a point being made, make it. But remarks on usage, grammar, and typos just makes you look like an overly-literal tool (if you care that much, email us). Be funny, be smart, have a conversation or make an observation.
Update 2/11/10 OK! We've been doing this for nearly a year, and so far, you guys have been GREAT. Most of you. But a few recent events have forced us to get a little more specific:
- Say you make a comment, and it's poorly received. DO NOT create another persona to then "chime in" to agree with you. This is called sock puppeting, it's completely unaccpetable (and more than a little sad) and will get you and your alternate personalities banned.
- Don't say racist, homophobic, or otherwise bigoted shit. YES, saying that the traits of one person is indicative of an entire group of people. Think that's "too PC"? We think you might be more comfortable here, then. Bye!
- Everyone who violates these policies will get one warning. If you take issue with that warning, again, there's a place for you. But if you stick around, and do it again, you may be banned.
- Oh, yeah, you can swear. We're cool with that.
Conflict policy
The San Francisco Appeal strives to be a trusted source for news and information about the City. Almost all of the contributors to the San Francisco Appeal have other sources of income (also known as "day jobs") that may or may not have overlap with what is covered on the site. Because of that, we want to make absolutely sure that readers understand that we pledge transparency and full disclosure so our readers can trust what they read on our site and are equipped to assess our credibility. What does that mean?
- Contributors won't write about or seek to influence posts on matters in which they have a direct personal and/or economic stake.
- Where we still see the potential for perceived conflict or bias based on the personal or economic interests of a contributor, we pledge to make additional disclosures.
- Finally, we'll rely on you to use our comment functions to keep us honest.
If you have any questions about this or any of our policies, please contact us.
Privacy Policy
Third Party Advertiser Cookies and Web Beacons
This web site participates in Six Apart Media, a comprehensive advertising program provided by Six Apart Ltd. for publishers all across the Web. This section of our privacy policy describes how Six Apart Ltd. and the third party advertising networks and advertisers that display advertisements through Six Apart Media (collectively, "Advertisers") collect, use, store and disclose data from visitors to this Web site.
A "cookie" is a small amount of data, which often includes an anonymous unique identifier that is sent to your browser from a Web site's computers and stored on your computer's hard drive. Cookies can be used to target advertisements relevant to your interests, based on your visits to different Web sites, to provide traffic measurement and other analytics and to conduct research.
A "Web beacon" is an electronic file on a Web page that allows a Web site to count users who have visited that page, to access certain cookies and to provide auditing, research and reporting for advertisers.
When your browser requests a page that displays advertising from one of the Advertisers, the Advertiser may view, edit or set its own cookie through your browser. In addition, the Advertiser may place its own Web beacon in the page, which may be triggered by your browser's request.
Advertiser Privacy Policies
If you would like to contact the Advertisers to learn more about their privacy policies and what options (if any) they offer to opt out of their data collection and use, please follow these links to their Web sites:
Six Apart Media third party advertising networks and advertisers
Some of these third party advertising networks are participants in the Network Advertising Initiative ("NAI"), a cooperative of online marketing and analytics companies committed to building consumer awareness and establishing responsible business and data management practices and standards. You can learn more about NAI and how you may "opt out" of targeted advertising delivered by NAI member ad networks here.
