Our goal with these guidelines is to help the community understand what is acceptable behavior for interacting with other Episode players and creators on our Discord and on Episode social media.
Starting August 12th, 2020, any actions taken as a member of our community and involving another community member or content will be subject to these guidelines. This includes activity on the Episode app, the Official Episode Discord and Episode-related accounts on other social media platforms.
While Episode related issues may occur on Instagram or other social media platforms, Episode cannot remove users from those platforms or stop them from engaging with others. However, an Episode user may face consequences on Episode for breaking our community guidelines on these other platforms. If you have an issue, you should use the official reporting systems of the platform you are on, in addition to reporting to us, if the issue is related to the Episode app or an Episode story.
Our Community’s Guiding Principles
Be Respectful.
Episode is a global community full of players with diverse backgrounds and lifestyles. Our points of view may never line up exactly, but we have a duty to actively listen to others, take feedback, and work towards being and doing better over time. Being polite and thoughtful, even during a disagreement, can go a long way towards finding common ground or rectifying mistakes. Apologizing and making changes can be the best way to move forward from a dispute.
Be Kind.
Episode is a community built on inclusion and diversity. We want stories and a community that show us the wide spectrum of people that live in the world and use our app. This means being accepting of and working towards the equality of others, by not promoting harmful stereotypes or using hate speech. This also applies to players or creators with whom you might disagree or who’s content you may not enjoy.
Be Supportive.
If you have feedback on another community member’s work, please be thoughtful and provide constructive criticism. This means offering specific or actionable feedback rather than simply insulting or tearing down another’s work. This does not mean you have to like every story or every author. We encourage authors and community members to be receptive to and hear constructive feedback and acknowledge that being receptive to feedback doesn’t come with a mandate to act on it.
Examples of What is Not Allowed
The following examples are designed to help answer questions you may have about what is considered an inappropriate or unacceptable behavior among the Episode community. We recognize that words and actions may mean different things across different cultures or communities, and that we cannot cover every example of the kinds of behavior you may see. Context and intent can also inform an incident and may play a key role in defining what is and is not deemed appropriate.
Hate Speech
We do not tolerate hate speech on the Episode app, official Discord, or social media pages.
We define hate speech as content that does or intends to attack, threaten, or dehumanize an individual or a group of individuals based on a protected attribute. These attributes include, but are not limited to: race, ethnicity, nationality, sexuality, sex, gender identity, religious affiliation, and disabilities.
Examples of hate speech includes, but is not limited to:
- Using a slur referring to a protected attribute either in a post or a direct message.
- Creating an anonymous account to harass another author using a slur, or hateful messages based on a protected attribute.
- Posting a dehumanizing comment about a group of individuals based on a protected attribute under the guise of a joke.
- Threatening an individual or a group based on a protected attribute with fictional or real world violence.
Bullying and Harassment
We do not tolerate behaviors that are intended to make others feel unsafe or unwelcome among the Episode community.
The definition of cyberbullying by StopBullying.gov, “includes sending, posting, or sharing negative, harmful, false, or mean content about someone else. It can include sharing personal or private information about someone else causing embarrassment or humiliation.”
Examples of bullying and/or harassment includes, but is not limited to:
- Revealing personal details about another community member, including their name, address, employer, email, or phone number.
- Threatening another community member’s well being, livelihood or health.
- Threatening to enact real-life violence on another community member through DMs or in comments, even as a ‘joke’.
- Telling someone that should harm, injure, or kill themselves, or that they are worthless, hated, or that no one likes them.
- Creating fake accounts to harass, intimidate, or threaten someone.
- Making or attempting to make unwanted sexual contact or advances towards another user.
- Directing followers or friends to harass or threaten another user through comments, public or private messages, or other means.
- Weaponizing the Episode community or content reporting system in service of a personal agenda.
Consequences:
Violations of our policy will be investigated based on the context of the issue, the severity of the violations, and an individual’s previous community guidelines infractions.
Violation of these standards can result in one or more of the following: email warnings, temporary or permanent suspension from all or parts of our platform, removal of an author’s name on a story purchased by Episode, or permanent removal of all of a user’s content from the Episode platform.
How To Report an Issue
In response to feedback from many of you we’ve streamlined and updated our reporting system. Reports of community issues related to bullying, harassment, or hate speech will go into a dedicated queue and into the hands of specially trained employees for investigation and responses as appropriate.
Starting today, you must submit a report of any of the behaviors above on our improved reporting form. This is the best and fastest way to reach us. While it may seem faster to DM us on IG or the Discord, we will only be able to tell you to send in a ticket with supporting screenshots or other documentation using the new form.
Tips for getting your reported issue reviewed as quickly as possible:
- Use the new reporting form
- Include specific information to help us identify negative behavior. Ex: Screenshots, user/account names, story titles, and specific chapters
Please note that we cannot always take immediate action, but our team investigates reports. Additionally, we would like to encourage official reporting as the first step to getting problematic content or behaviors addressed. Lastly, we understand that it can be frustrating, but our TOS and player privacy considerations prevent us from providing updates on actions taken against individuals or accounts.
Comments
0 comments
Article is closed for comments.