These guidelines are intended to keep community features useful, safe, and relevant. They do not replace applicable law, university rules that may independently apply to you, or the policies of third-party services linked from UC Merced Hub.
1. Core Rules
- Be relevant. Use community features for their intended purpose and keep submissions reasonably related to the UC Merced community, campus information, or the specific feature you are using.
- Be respectful. Do not use the Service to target, harass, threaten, intimidate, or demean other people.
- Be accurate. Do not knowingly submit fabricated reports, misleading locations, impersonations, or intentionally false information.
- Respect privacy. Do not expose private or sensitive information about another person without authorization.
- Respect ownership. Only upload content you have the right to submit.
- Use safety tools appropriately. Reporting and blocking features exist to protect users and the community; do not abuse them to harass or retaliate against others.
2. Prohibited Content and Behavior
Do not post, upload, or use UC Merced Hub to distribute content or behavior that includes:
- Credible threats, encouragement of violence, or instructions intended to harm people or animals.
- Harassment, bullying, stalking, targeted intimidation, or repeated unwanted abuse.
- Hateful or dehumanizing content targeting people based on protected characteristics.
- Sexually explicit content, sexual exploitation, or sexual content involving minors.
- Graphic content whose primary purpose is to shock, glorify injury, or depict severe harm without a legitimate informational reason.
- Promotion or facilitation of illegal activity.
- Doxxing or publication of private personal information, such as private addresses, personal phone numbers, private account credentials, or other sensitive identifying information.
- Impersonation intended to deceive other users.
- Spam, scams, repetitive promotional content, malicious links, or attempts to manipulate Service features.
- Copyrighted or otherwise protected material you do not have permission to share.
- Content designed to bypass moderation, reporting, blocking, account restrictions, or other safety controls.
3. Wildlife Capture Guidelines
Wildlife posts should help the community understand legitimate wildlife observations without creating unnecessary risk.
- Do not harm, chase, trap, feed, provoke, or intentionally disturb wildlife for the purpose of creating a post.
- Do not encourage other users to approach wildlife in an unsafe or unlawful way.
- Use accurate locations and descriptions to the best of your knowledge; do not intentionally create false sightings.
- Avoid posting images that unnecessarily expose private individuals or sensitive personal information.
- If a situation presents an immediate danger to people or animals, use the appropriate emergency or campus/public-safety resources. UC Merced Hub is not an emergency-reporting service.
4. Privacy and Personal Information
Community posts may be visible to other users. Before posting, review images and text for information you did not intend to share. Do not use a wildlife or map post to track, identify, shame, or expose another person.
How UC Merced Hub handles account, verification, location, post, report, and block information is described in our Privacy Policy.
5. Reporting and Blocking
If you encounter objectionable content or abusive behavior, use the available in-app reporting or blocking controls.
- Report: Use reporting for content or users that may violate these rules. Include an accurate reason so the issue can be reviewed efficiently.
- Block: Use blocking when you do not want to see or interact with content from a particular account as supported by the app.
- Urgent follow-up: If you already submitted a report and need to provide additional context, email [email protected].
Do not submit knowingly false reports or coordinate reports merely to punish users with whom you disagree.
6. Moderation and Enforcement
We may review reported or otherwise identified content and take reasonable action based on the nature and severity of the issue. Actions may include:
- Removing or limiting content.
- Warning or restricting an account.
- Suspending or terminating access to community features or the Service.
- Preserving limited records where reasonably necessary for safety, abuse prevention, disputes, or legal compliance.
Serious or repeated violations may result in stronger action without a prior warning. We may also act when content creates a substantial safety, security, or legal risk even if a specific example is not listed above.
7. Appeals and Questions
If you believe moderation action was taken in error, or if you have a question about these guidelines, contact [email protected]. Include enough context to identify the content or account involved, but do not send passwords or verification codes.
8. Updates to These Guidelines
We may update these guidelines as community features change. The current version will be posted here with an updated date. Continued use of community posting features after an update is subject to the current guidelines.