Etiquette of the ImproveVia Community

ImproveVia Community Guidelines

If you come across content that fails to fall within these guidelines, please let the user who is improperly using ImproveVia know, and let us know by clicking the "report/flag" button you'll find next to every Ivia, Profile, or Comment.

As with everything involved with ImproveVia, this is an ever-changing set of rules. We encourage any feedback and or improvements on this Ivia.

1. Only Claim Credit for Your Own Work, Citations are Necessary for Others’ Work:

ImproveVia is a platform for improving and pioneering everything — not for taking credit of other peoples work. If you want to show your appreciation for someone else's work, you can click the “Upvote” button, leave them a positive comment, or you can promote work via social sharing sites like Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, Reddit, etc.

If you wish to improve or expand upon someone else’s work or idea, it is important to give the creator full credit for the work you borrow from. Users who fail to cite others’ work not only violate the community guidelines of ImproveVia, but risk protective action from those who hold the rights to the content.

If you are not sure whether your use of work or trademarks belonging to another person or entity, you should consult publicly available reference materials at the U.S. Copyright Office website, the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office website, the Chilling Effects website, or talk to an intellectual property attorney. If you want to report misuse of your own creative work or your own trademark by one of our users, you can do that here [insert link].

2. Respect Privacy:

Don't use ImproveVia to reveal private information about other people. And don't upload photographic portraits or nude images of identifiable people unless you have their permission.

If you'd like to learn more about what is (and isn't) allowed on ImproveVia, please read through our Terms of Use.

3. Use Professional Presentation

Use proper spelling and grammar to the best of your ability and knowledge, and attempt  to present yourself in a clear and understandable manner. Your comments, Ivias, and other activities will comprise your user profile, and will determine your legitimacy as a contributor.

ImproveVia is a platform for improving everything, including yourself. Try to present yourself in the best possible light when working on ImproveVia!

4. Select the Right Category

Each Ivia will fall under one of the twelve major categories shown below. When formulating an Ivia, be sure to select the category that best pertains to what your Ivia is about. 

If you select the wrong category - don't worry!  You can go back and change it at any time. (for example, if another person suggests a category that fits better)

5. Be an Active User

The more involved you are, the more worthiwhile content you are likely to produce, and the better chance you have to come up with something truly impactful. Nothing great happens overnight - be involved, Upvote or Downvote, share, and contribute to as many Ivias as possible.

6. Vote with Integrity

The goal of ImproveVia is for people to work together to come up with solutions for problems, big and small, that are helpful and innovative. Vote for things that seem helpful and valuable to you, and vote down things that are not. 

Vote based on the content of the Ivia or comment; do not vote someone down because you don't like them, or because you disagreed with his or her earlier work. Vote for something  if you like it, but think twice before you vote down something perfectly acceptable just because you don't agree with it.

Don't ask for votes. If other people appreciate your contribution they will vote and comment accordingly. If you ask for votes ... you may be rather less likely to get them, anyway.

If you vote down an Ivia, please consider why you did so, and you are encouraged to add a comment detailing what you did not like about it. Helpful feedback is always a good (and productive) thing!