New Look to the Forum

[Taz]

As you can probably tell some major changes have just happened. 

The old phpBB forum system was old, decrepit and in need of putting out of it's misery.
It had served us well for a good few years and is was worn out and getting cranky from the amount of abuse it had taken over those faithful years of service it had given us.

So I have booked it into the phpBB retirement home where it can live out the rest of it's days in happiness while it prepares to make it's final journey tot he great phpBB forum graveyard in the Server Heavens.

Welcome to the New Look GanjaTaz.com Forums people!

If you have just returned to us after a leave of absence and ca't remember you Log in details, http://www.ganjataz.com/forum-smf/index.php?action=reminder use that with your E-Mail address to recover your password and account.

Please spend a bit of time getting used to the new Format and Features, and before posting 20 million threads go through your Profile Options and Settings first and see what is on offer.

As you will see it has some features that the older phpBB forum did not and is missing a few that the phpBB system did have.  On the whole though I think you will find this new system is much more feature rich and a better system.

It will take us all a little bit of time to get used to the New Look and feel but I am sure it will be time well spent.


Some of you will notice Sigs are now activated again, a word on this, keep them short, small or I will edit them.  We are here to post and read posts, not scroll past endless huge Sigs, Quotes, Images or mindless bollocks best saved for Blogs, LJ's or MySpace and other sites of that nature.  If you have your sig edited, don't ask why, put 2 & 2 together and deal with the answer you come up with, I decided it was too big or annoying myself or other users so it got cut.  Abuse this issue more than once and you will be told you are no longer entitled to a Signature.

[Taz]

A notice to all Members.

The Terms And Conditions/Rules of the Site & Forum have always stated that you must be using a Valid E-Mail Address at all times for your Account here.

Having just been hit with about 90 bounced E-Mail messages when I informed all Members via a Mass E-Mail of the New Look change & the new forum URL you can no doubt guess it has become obvious some of you are not.  Granted the bulk of these are older members who have not posted for a long time and some of the Spam Accounts that were created on the older phpBB system set up, the point stands, please make sure your Account E-Mail is Valid and can get E-Mails from this Domain as soon as you can please.

This may mean you have to allow the ganjataz.com Domain to bypass your Spam Filters but come on, I do not, nor have I ever sent Spam to my members, so do me a favour, double check your account settings to make sure the one you use is Valid and that your E-Mail Spam Filters are not blocking this Domain.

[Taz]

Along with the New Look the Registration Agrement also got a Facelift, this is retroactive so by agreeing to the old one you now agree to this one by default.

So read through it and make sure it is understood please.

Welcome to the New Look GanjaTaz forums and Community!

First things first...

1) You are HIGHLY ADVISED to read what follows, it is legally binding and you are about to agree to what is contained below before being allowed to Register an Account.

2) I pay for the Web Space and Bandwidth to run this Forum and Community and I own the Domain name.

3) So it is my ball game.

4) This is not, and nor ever has it been a Democracy, if you don't like the idea of that you are advised to Log out now.

Next:

You have no choice but to use a Valid E-Mail address to be part of this Forum as without a Valid E-Mail address you will not be able to respond to the Verification process this forum uses to Activate your own account.

Anyone caught changing their account E-Mail once Verification has been done to one that is Invalid will be warned once, no second warning will occur your account will just be deleted if you do not change to a Valid E-Mail account.

This is so I do not have to put up with endless bounced E-Mails flooding my E-Mail box because you have been sent a Private Message and have Enabled the Option to be notified each time you get one or for some other User Option that means you get an E-Mail from this Server/Forum. Do the Maths and you will work out this could create a massive amount of Spam E-Mails I have to put up with over the space of even a relatively short period of time, so I am not bothering anymore.

Most Hotmail, Yahoo and MSN E-Mails are (or will be) disallowed, this is to cut down on Spam Accounts being created. AOL accounts are also a major pain in the arse as most of the time any mail sent to them is straight away returned because AOL suck and are notorious for causing issues! So AOL will be the first to be disallowed once I get around to it.

I do not, nor have I ever sent Spam messages from this Forum or Domain, only Important Update messages to Users have been sent, or User Opted/Profile Option selected Messages.



The Agreement between You and this Forum.

You agree, through your use of this forum, that you will not post any material which is false, defamatory, inaccurate, abusive, vulgar, hateful, harassing, obscene, profane, sexually oriented, threatening, invasive of a person's privacy, adult material, or otherwise in violation of any International or United Kingdoms law. You also agree not to post any copyrighted material unless you own the copyright or you have written consent from the owner of the copyrighted material. Spam, flooding, advertisements, chain letters, pyramid schemes, and solicitations are also forbidden on this forum. Break any of the above and you Might be warned, but then again I may just Ban you and report you for what you did. I take Fraud very seriously and Online Fraud is an instant Ban from this Forum, so Alternate Accounts/Nicknames/Trolls are prohibited and will be put down on sight with extreme prejudice and malice.

Note that it is impossible for the staff or the owners of this forum to confirm the validity of posts. Please remember that we do not actively monitor the posted messages, and as such, are not responsible for the content contained within. We do not warrant the accuracy, completeness, or usefulness of any information presented. The posted messages express the views of the author, and not necessarily the views of this forum, its staff, its subsidiaries, or this forum's/Domain names owner. Anyone who feels that a posted message is objectionable is encouraged to notify an administrator or moderator of this forum immediately. The staff and the owner of this forum reserve the right to remove objectionable content, within a reasonable time frame, if they determine that removal is necessary. This is a manual process, however, please realize that they may not be able to remove or edit particular messages immediately. This policy applies to member profile information as well. Any disputes about a Moderators action can be checked with the in built Modification log and the Forum Owner will have the last say in any disputes.

You remain solely responsible for the content of your posted messages. Furthermore, you agree to indemnify and hold harmless the owners of this forum, any related web sites to this forum, its staff, and its subsidiaries. The owners of this forum also reserve the right to reveal your identity (or any other related information collected on this service such as your ISP and IP addresses) in the event of a formal complaint or legal action arising from any situation caused by your use of this forum.

You have the ability, as you register, to choose your username. We advise that you keep the name appropriate. With this user account you are about to register, you agree to never give your password out to another person except an administrator, for your protection and for validity reasons. You also agree to NEVER use another person's account for any reason. We also HIGHLY recommend you use a complex and unique password for your account, to prevent account theft.

After you register and login to this forum, you will be able to fill out a detailed profile. It is your responsibility to present clean and accurate information. Any information the forum owner or staff determines to be inaccurate or vulgar in nature will be removed, with or without prior notice. Appropriate sanctions may be applicable.

Please note that with each post, your IP address is recorded, in the event that you need to be banned from this forum or your ISP contacted. This will only happen in the event of a major violation of this agreement.

Also note that the software places a cookie, a text file containing bits of information (such as your username and password), in your browser's cache. This is ONLY used to keep you logged in/out. The software does not collect or send any other form of information to your computer.

You are Advised to Allow Pop Ups from this Domain (www.ganjataz.com) so you can be notified of any User Profile Selected Pop Up Messages or Warnings. I do not serve any form of Advertising/Spyware/Malware Pop Ups or Pop Unders, so this is for your own benefit if you want to have User Selected Options for Pop Up messages and alerts.

Many thanks for your interest in Registering at this Forum, I hope you enjoy your time here and within the community contained within.

Cheers,

Taz.
Administrator, Domain Owner and The Webmaster of www.ganjataz.com.

[Taz]

Some of the phpBB settings did not follow us when the conversion happened, or they got changed slightly to work with the SMF system.

One of these is the old "Custom Title" system.  This is now become Member Group title, as such I will have to rework this minor bug when I have less important things to do & have finished locking down more serious matters such as security and running through diagnostics with the new set up so nothing major is b0rk or going to fuck up.

You still have the option to have titles or text that you can choose within your Profile settings, so till I get around to it play with those for now. 

[Taz]

Those who Were Moderators on the previous phpBB version will be reinstated in time.

That said, those Mods who have had an extended absence from the forums will not be gaining their Modships back, unless they return to the boards and again start taking part in the community on at least a semi regular basis.  I see little point giving Modships and the powers associated with them to those who are not around to perform their duties if it is required.

& as the forum is not heaving with new posts every day or flooded with new members I do not see any reason to have more than a handful of capable people who are around enough to deal with any situation that should arise during a period when myself or Rob are not here.

I always said that anyone who is deserving of a Modship would only keep it if they were about enough to warrant having the title, while I do appreciate that some may have been away for a lengthy period of time for legitimate reasons, I am sure they can appreciate that the Forum needs people to be here to do the duty that a Modship requires.

[Taz]

As you may now notice when Posting or Creating New threads in the Additional Options Menu you may now upload attachments.

100KB limit per upload and 1 upload per post.

Do not get caught Hotlinking the images you upload here on other forums or using them on other sites. (Currently Attachements are encrypted so this is not really possible, it may however change in the future.)  If you are stupid enough to leech my bandwidth you will pay for that months bandwidth bill in total or have the choice of getting banned.
So don't do it huh.