The primary duty of a thread host is to set the tone of the thread and keep the discussion as focused as you can (or want). You are free to promote any level of civility you desire, but you should maintain a level of civility with the participants in your thread that is higher than what you are shooting for within the thread. The most successful threads are usually those which do not discourage points of view from any angle. As long as participants do not violate the Rules of Engagement, how far they are allowed to go is entirely up to you, but please try to be as even-handed as possible. You have the ability to move posts to a more appropriate thread, or delete posts if necessary. Please be very thoughtful and careful about exercising these options.

Clarify your ambitions for the thread. If you don't like personal abuse or sexual references or off-topic posts, say so at the start, and repeat it as necessary. Posters should not have to discover the hosts likes and dislikes through his or her deletion/move policy.

Possible reasons for deleting/moving posts:

• personal information revealed about someone other than the poster him/herself
• spam or advertising
• posts with HTML errors that throw off the margins for the entire page
• excessive off-topic posts
• general disruption and harassment derailing the thread

The first two are in the Rules of Engagement. The others are things to consider. You should be discreet and lenient in hosting. Most participants are pretty well-behaved and we don't want to be heavy-handed. Recognize that in the heat of a discussion, things can get ugly. Try not to take it personally. If a poster repeatedly violates the rules you have set forth for your thread, or violates the RoE, contact a moderator about a possible suspension of that poster.

Links to information at other websites may be posted in the butter sidebar. If you need help doing this, contact us with the link information. A particularly interesting discussion may also be posted in the News section of the homepage.

These things are done at this url: http://www.themote.com/maintain
Sign in with your registered ID and password.

If activity in your thread drops off, you may be contacted by one of the moderators regarding ending your thread. Otherwise, when the thread is ready to end, please ask a moderator to put up an RIP tag. After three days, the thread can be placed into read-only mode and moved into the archives.

Most threads will run pretty well on their own if you are busy and can't spend much time there for a short period, though some threads require a good deal of attention. If you must be absent for any length of time, a new host can sometimes be found, or the thread can be retired. We realize that this is a volunteer operation and real life sometimes imposes constraints on cyber-life.

Enjoy your thread and thank you for hosting.