Valve Developer Community:Policies and Guidelines
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This page documents the Valve Developer Community's accepted policies and guidelines. A collection of standards and practices held by the vast majority of the community, through consensus, that reflect the expected behavioral conduct of new and experienced users alike.
These are not hard-and-fast rules. They are not to be used against other users, or exploited, for the unethical, immoral or illegitimate benefit of oneself or another person. The rules do not cover all scenarios or situations. Common sense should be employed and consensus of the community should be followed and prioritized.
The following policies and guidelines are not a replacement for, nor do they take precedence over the site's Terms and Conditions, as well as the Steam Subscriber Agreement, in which you as user agreed to both per the site's registration process.
Terms of Use
Editing
Article content
Images
User content
Images
Images used on user pages aren't exempt from the image use policy.
While these types of images can be used more leniently, they should also follow the following guidelines:
- They should be placed within one of the applicable subcategories of Category:User images.
- They should not be used on non-user namespace pages.
User names
User names must not be:
- Profane, vulgar, offensive, libelous or defamatory.
- Used to threaten, slander or attack another person.
- Used to impersonate someone else.
User pages
User pages must not be placed outside the user namespace.
A user page is generally edited only by the user who owns it. Edits that aim to improve functionality without fundamentally changing anything about a user page are usually accepted, but only insofar as the owner of the user page sees fit. A user may also be allowed to edit a user page, without express permission from the owner of the user page, if the intention is to add a notice used to inform an editor on the ill intentions of said user. However, if said user has demonstrated that they haven't done anything objectionable, then they are allowed to promptly remove the aforementioned notice.
If a user has been blocked temporarily, and has had a notice placed on their user page informing users of their block, then that notice must be kept upon their block expiring.
Elevated privileges
Deletion
Pages may be deleted if they violate the Image use policy, the mod profile criteria, the Terms of Use or any of the mentioned policies and guidelines.
Images may be deleted if they lack effort or quality, aren't properly licensed, violate copyright terms or trademark rights, and/or aren't used anywhere.
Blatant policy violations may be speedily deleted. This occurs through a step-by-step process in which the {{delete}} template is applied to the offending article, the matter is discussed at Reasons for speedy deletion, the article is or isn't deleted, and then the discussion is closed.
Blocks
Users who prove to be disruptive may be blocked from editing the wiki for reasons that are, but not limited to:
- Vandalism
- Spam
- Edit warring
- Sockpuppetry
- Copyright violations
- Intimidation or harassment
- Breaching the Terms of Use
- Breaching the Steam Subscriber Agreement
- Breaching the Etiquette
- Breaching the aforementioned policies and guidelines.
