MODERATION REMINDER - Formal Guidelines For Transition To "Non-OT" Season

I am posting this earlier than I normally would in this final week of OT Season because we're likely a bit rusty regarding this. 

The OT Season officially comes to an end at midnight on Saturday, so effectively plan on OT Season ending around 11:30 PM this coming Friday to allow time for a little cleanup of this week or to allow some threads to simply disappear naturally into the abyss.

What does that mean for you? Veterans will know the answer, but for newer folks or infrequent visitors, here is your yearly reminder.

When we say “end of OT season”, it is more a “significant narrowing of scope” – in other words, not every single OT thread will be removed outright.

That said, please note that the burden of to prove worthiness for such threads is on you - if you plan on posting such a thread, is provide a pretty damn good explanation of why it should stay (or the reason may be self-evident) – and yes, frivolous ones will be removed as always. I realize some people would prefer a hard stop, but this is a community and we’ll consider things that might be of note to the community, even during the “non-OT” months. 

Other items:

1. The Snowflake Rule will apply after games. Those threads which are mere hot takes that could easily fit into a snowflake thread will likely go. I understand why the Snowflake threads are not popular in many segments of the MGoPopulation, but there has to be a way to mitigate hot takes and make sure they don’t bury more worthwhile content. I welcome suggestions for alternatives, but none that create more work for the mods because let's face it - we're not paid and therefore not THAT inclined to sift through your shit. "Just don't do anything" is also the wrong answer. 
    
2. Please take care in general to consider carefully what you want to say if you’re going to create a thread. Search the threads for similar threads – that’s typically what I use as a measuring stick for “redundant”. As for breaking news, make sure that you check the publish dates on articles – you can almost be assured that anything over an hour old has made it to the board barring a huge oversight (and sometimes, something does get overlooked). Normal rules on sourcing apply as well.
    
3. DO NOT attack players or fellow MGoBloggers personally. Ad hominems are essentially your ticket to Bolivia or worse depending on the severity of the statement. I know people get emotional after games, but do try to run your initial reaction by your frontal cortex first for proper review. Criticizing play and strategy is fine, but basically bringing someone’s mom into it, if you will, is your way of telling the mods you no longer wish to be here.
    
4. Report potential infractions or questionable posts in the Mod Sticky with a link to the comment or thread - there likely will not be time to sift through entire threads, so specific links are incredibly helpful. If there is a delay in getting to an issue, remember that the mods have lives too, but if it is something that really should go, say, right now, find me or Rob or anyone else with "scary mod powers" on social media. If you don't do social media, well, it's 2021 and you're a member of a species that got this far anyway, so I trust you to figure this out. 
    
5. Sunday (also Thursday and Monday) NFL threads will be allowed as always - enough of us have loyalties to pro teams that this normally fills a couple days in the week here too. Pro sports events which are significant are fine as well (World Series, NBA or NHL coverage, etc…) – just not every bit of news. I know people gripe about the amount of Lions coverage during the NFL season, but try to remember that a sizeable number of the active users on this site also live in Michigan or grew up here.
    
6. Threads covering other college games should typically be OK, but do try to keep the tradition of “Saturday Noon Games Thread”, for example, on the weekends (and on Thursdays and Fridays when sometimes there is a significant slate too). The tradition of MACtion is absolutely OK. If something noteworthy is happening in a particular game, a separate thread should be fine but detail the reason for breaking out of the open thread coverage - a random Bowling Green thread, for example, will be dumped if you don't tell us why it is there.
    
7. COVID-19 threads - I am not going to say "absolutely not", because it may come to a point where there is something generally applicable to Michigan athletics that all of us need to know in a pandemic. If that is the news you have, that's fine. If what you have, however, is your hot take on the subject or something from the depths of YouTube, then PLEASE KEEP IT TO YOURSELF. NO ONE CARES ABOUT YOUR OPINION REGARDING THE MERITS OF PARTICULAR PUBLIC HEALTH POLICIES. Thank you, that was my TED Talk on the subject. 

If any of the mods have additions to this, please post them - this is certainly not meant to be a comprehensive