Workers Solidarity Movement

The guidelines below will help explain why we decide not to publish or to remove some comments from the site. If you have any problems with editorial decisions please use the Contact Us form to tell us about them. If you include your email address we will be able to reply to you.

WSM.IE is run by an editorial group drawn from members of the Workers Solidarity Movement. The articles we choose to publish will reflect this.

However anybody can submit a story for publication and if it is consistent with our core political statement it will probably be published. Anyone can post a comment on a story on WSM.IE  If you are registered in our Contact system your comment will be published instantly when you are logged in once your account has been judged as genuine.  Otherwise it will first be reviewed by an editor and will be published if it does no breach our guidelines below.  Speed of publication will vary according to editor availability.

We want the comments on the articles to be about serious, real debate or additional information and questions about the article. To create an atmosphere where serious discussion flourishes we will monitor and remove comments that undermine such an atmosphere.

In general, comments may be removed for any of the following reasons:

• Comments with no link to the story they are posted under. The comment must be relevant to the story.
• Advertising or other inappropriate content. Identical comments posted to more than one story. Post your comment only under the most relevant article not to multiple articles on the same topic.
• Continuing debates across multiple articles. WSM.IE is not a bulletin board. All comments should directly relate to the article or preceding comments. Users should refrain from constantly bringing up points from previous threads, unless they have a close relevance to the new article. Users should also note that repetitive demands of another user to answer a particular question or point is a reason for deletion especially when it occurs across multiple threads.
• Cut and pastes. Do not post as comments articles or comments that have been posted on other sites or elsewhere on WSM.IE. If you think material elsewhere is relevant post a summary and a URL for it not the entire piece.
• Infactual or obviously false posts. The onus is on the author to check and confirm facts - if a clear factual error is brought to our attention it will be removed.
• Trolling.Comments which contain abuse towards any group, individual, or article without attempting to situate this in the context of the particular article or debate arising out of that article. So for example, a comment which simply says: "the Popular Front of Judea are wankers" will be deleted, while a comment that says: "The fact that the PFJ have refused this offer of an alliance shows them to be hypocritical in the light of what they have said before", might remain
• Libelous or slanderous posts. Choose your language carefully. Do not make allegations against named individuals unless you can substantiate them.
• Personal abuse. Any comment containing personal abuse or unsubstantiated allegations about named individuals, particularly if those individuals are not public figures.
• Revealing posters real identities or personal information about them. It is up to a poster to decide whether to use all or some of their real name, if they choose not to do not reveal additional information about them.
• Impersonation. Comments which impersonate other WSM.IE users by adoption of their names or regular pseudonyms
• Discriminatory or hateful posts. Posts that contain explicitly racist, sexist or homophobic views will be removed
• Fascists. All content expressing fascist views or written by active fascists, or expressing revisionist / holocaust denial positions, or linking to a fascist site. We will not provide a platform for fascist recruitment
• Persistent Abuse. Users who persistently refuse to abide by WSM.IE policy are liable to have any and all of their contributions removed. In extreme cases we may seek to prevent them posting to the site in the future.
• Comments on editorial policy. Users can make suggestions by contacting the editors using the 'Contact Us' link at the top of the front page. Editorial actions are decided on our editorial list. Commentary on WSM.IE editorial policy on the newswire will be removed
• Comments that refer to Deleted Posts. Comments referring to something that a user can't see as it has been deleted will also be removed.

Note - the above guidelines were originally based on ones used by indymedia.ie 

Agreed by June 2013 Delegate Council