By using this Forum, you agree to follow FactoryoftheFuture.org Forum Guidelines and Community Guidelines, listed below. You also agree to abide by our Terms Agreement and Privacy Policy.

Better than Google

Google’s motto is: “Don’t be evil.” Which is a good start, but hardly enough to create a professional, functional community. We want to be far better than “not evil”! So, be super polite, sensitive and supportive.

“I learned that it is the weak who are cruel, and that gentleness is to be expected only from the strong.” – Leo Rosten, Screenwriter

• Be polite, that means honoring people’s thoughts and feelings, even if you know better than them, or disagree.
• Don’t make issues personal and don’t take things personally.
• Respect – Honor the other person’s opinion as possibly valid.
• Before jumping to conclusions, ask clarifying questions.
• Separate facts from opinion (by identifying your opinions as opinions)
• And we know this is hard, but please try to stay away from sarcasm, unless it’s specifically noted as such. Example: “Your steel-toed work boots are so pretty! (Sarcasm)”
• This is not a place for trolls or naysayers. Please no attacking or insulting people.
• Support each other to think big and be great!

And would you please…

• Post only content that fits our manufacturing-focused community.
• If you are submitting content from other sites, would you please find the original source of the content, and submit that.
• Search for duplicates before posting.
• Use proper grammar and spelling, to the best of your ability. And please only write some words in ALL CAPS for emphasis.
• “Like” posts that you think contribute to the FactoryoftheFuture.org community in a positive way.
• Report spam by telling us about it in the feedback form on the bottom-right corner of the page. But please don’t report posts just because you do not like the content.
• Feel free to post links to your own or your company’s website, but use the 9:1 ratio – only 1 out of every 10 of your forum posts should link back to your own or your company’s website.
• Read over your submission for mistakes before submitting.

Community Guidelines

Welcome to FactoryoftheFuture.org. These Community Guidelines are incorporated into our Terms Agreement and therefore are part of what governs your use of the FactoryoftheFuture.org website (“Site”). By using this Site, you are agreeing to comply with and be bound by the following Community Guidelines, which together with our Terms Agreement and Privacy Policy, governs the relationship between you and Factory of the Future, LLC, owner and provider of the Site. The terms “Provider” or “us” or “we” or “our” refer to the owner of the Site. The terms “you” or “your” refer to any user or viewer of the Site.

At FactoryoftheFuture.org we’re building an online community to grow and strengthen manufacturing by promoting innovation and problem solving. We want to collectively create a vision of new manufacturing – one that is agile, innovative, sustainable and profitable: for the people, the company and the planet; manufacturing that is faster, more efficient, and uses fewer resources.

Our community is diverse, which makes our content interesting and more useful, since our collective smarts make for a magnificent Mastermind for Manufacturing©! We believe that everyone has something to contribute. We do not believe in labels, such as young, old, educated, uneducated, slow or quick. We believe that insight and creativity can come from anyone, and that people’s potential for contribution is not bound by gender, ethnicity or social class. We each have the potential to do great things.

FactoryoftheFuture.org strives to be a place for free thinking, taking action that gives us purpose, and learning to master our lives. A place where people interested in manufacturing can build rapport, show support and appreciation, and contribute to a community fellowship.

Although chaos sometimes breeds creativity and we want to foster creativity, we feel that guidelines are necessary to make FactoryoftheFuture.org a useful, productive and safe community. We want to be a tolerant place for ideas, people, links, and discussion.

To accomplish our mission we set forth the following Community Guidelines (“Guidelines”). By using this Site, you agree to abide by the following Guidelines:

Conduct:

We expect you to conduct yourself on the Site in an adult and professional manner. Meaning, would you please always be on your best behavior?

The Basics:

Be cautious.

Do not post trade secrets, confidential information, or what you really think about your boss.

Be overly gracious.

Being overly gracious sounds like just normal friendliness on the Internet. Most human communication is conveyed through body language and tone of voice, which we can’t see or hear when you type. So would you please use extra “pleases,” and “thank yous”? Thank you!

Ask first.

Unless someone is specifically asking for advice, you might want to ask before offering it. Example: “Would you like some advice?” or “May I offer some advice?”

Avoid arguing.

Mature debates are okay, but try to keep it polite. If somebody disagrees with you, respect his or her opinion.

Keep your cool.

If someone does do or say something that gets you angry – don’t respond. Or, at least don’t respond right away, or with anger. First, feel confident that the person has made him/herself look bad, and everyone can probably see that.

Be the bigger person.

Take the high road. When you write a response, have someone else read it before you post it, or at least have your computer read it back to you to make sure that it sounds gracious, level-headed and polite.

Don’t insult people.

Calling people names or saying that they are “stupid” is one of the least adult things you can do. Don’t attack anyone personally and don’t take things personally.

Take responsibility.

Admit when you are wrong and apologize.

Avoid sarcasm.

Sarcasm does not come across well on the Internet. You will avoid bunches of misunderstandings by just being straightforward and sincere.

Re-read before you post.

Always think about how people would interpret your statements. Is there any way you can make it sound nicer?

A Word of Caution…

Please keep in mind… anything you post will be on the World Wide Web, meaning, ANYONE in the world will be able to see it.  You are responsible for your posts and any wrongful posts could have CONSEQUENCES AND COULD LEAD TO CRIMINAL AND CIVIL LIABILITY.

By using this Site you further agree…

Site Security:

• not to collect users’ information or content using any means, including: manually, harvesting bots, robots, spiders, or scrapers;
• not to do anything that could disable, overburden, or impair the proper working of the Site;
• not to post anything that contains any computer viruses or worms, or any other potentially damaging computer programs or files.

Account Security:

• to keep your contact information accurate and up-to-date;
• not to provide any false personal information, or create an account for anyone other than yourself without permission;
• not to share your password, let anyone else access your account, or do anything else that might jeopardize the security of your account;
• not to solicit login information or access an account belonging to someone else;
• not to use a third party’s account, user name or password at any time;
• not to create more than one personal account;
• not to transfer your account to anyone without first getting our written permission;
• you will not create another account if we disable your account;
• not to use our Site if you are under 18 without parental permission.

Now for the tough stuff…

There are certain egregious offenses that may result in legal proceedings, not to mention getting you banned from the Site. (Again, you agree not to create another account if we disable your account.) By using this Site, you also agree to abide by the following rules:

You agree that you will not post anything that:

• is known by you to be false, inaccurate or misleading;
• contains anyone’s personally identifiable information or financial information;
• infringes anyone’s copyright, patent, trademark, trade secret or other proprietary rights, or rights of publicity or privacy;
• violates any law, statute, ordinance, or regulation (including, but not limited to, those governing export control, consumer protection, unfair competition, antidiscrimination, or false advertising);
• is, or may reasonably be considered to be, defamatory, libelous, hateful, racially or religiously biased or offensive, unlawfully threatening or unlawfully harassing, or advocates or encourages illegal conduct harmful to any individual, partnership or corporation;
• is hate speech, threatening, or pornographic, incites violence, or contains nudity or graphic or gratuitous violence;
• can be interpreted as bullying, intimidating, or harassing;
• is alcohol-related, tobacco-related, dating-related or contains other mature content;
• facilitates or encourages any violations of our policies, or otherwise violates our Terms Agreement and Privacy Policy.

Alleged Violation Procedures:

To ensure that we provide a high quality experience for you and for other users of the Site, you agree that Factory of the Future, LLC or its representatives, may access your account and records on a case-by-case basis to investigate complaints or allegations of abuse, infringement of third-party rights, or other unauthorized uses of the Site.

We reserve the right to take action, such as removing content, or suspending or deleting your account or your access to the Site immediately, with or without notice to you, and without liability to you, if we believe that you have violated any of the Terms Agreement furnished us with false or misleading information, or interfered with use of the Site by others.

We may work with law enforcement when we believe there is a genuine risk of criminal harm, physical harm, or direct threats to public safety.

The consequences for violating these Community Guidelines may, but need not, vary depending on the severity of the violation and the user’s history. For example, we may warn a user for a first violation, but if we continue to see further violations we may restrict a user’s ability to post or ban the user altogether. You agree that we may take any action that we deem necessary, in our sole discretion, to enforce these Community Guidelines, the Terms Agreement, and any other policies of this Site.

If you are removed from the Site, you may request a refund of the prorated portion of your membership fee.

Thank you for reading and abiding by these Community Guidelines.