This part of my user's guide covers the reporting mechanism and how to use it to maintain good content on the site. It was last updated on 25 December 2009.

As anda continue to use Fanpop, anda will come across content that is not what it should be in some way. Since Fanpop is largely only as good as the content it contains, it is important to address these issues for the good of the site and the Fanpop community.

Now, most of the content that "is not what it should be" is likely just content that anda don't like, and such content should be rated appropriately (see the link). But, rarely, there is some content on the site lebih problematic than that, and for such content there exists the reporting function. Reporting allows you, the user, to flag something on Fanpop as being wrong in some way, so that it will be fixed.

Here's a handy guide to distinguishing between different types of problem content, and whether ratings atau reporting should be applied.

* anda disagree with a particular user (rate)
* anda don't like what the user says (rate)
* anda find the user obnoxious and harassing (ignore)
* The user uses obscene language and/or posts obscene content (report)
* The user attempts to sell a product atau encourages anda to buy a product (report)
* The user consistently attacks and demeans anda (report)
* anda suspect the user is actually a duplicate account of another user (ignore)
* Content is telah diposkan that anda think sucks (rate)
* Content is telah diposkan without kata kunci (rate)
* Content is telah diposkan with inadequate kata kunci (rate)
* Content is telah diposkan in the wrong spot (report)
* Content link does not work (report)
* Content link is to a web site which hasn't been updated in years (rate)
* Content link is for a contest which has already ended (report)
* Video link doesn't work embedded (rate)
* Video is short, low-quality, video is out of sync with audio (rate)
* Video requires users to install software on their desktops in order to view it (rate/comment)
* Video doesn't work embedded nor on the sumber site (report)
* Video is offensive/obscene (report)
* Video takes forever to load (rate)
* Video not what anda expected (rate)
* Video is unrelated to the spot topic (report)
* Content exactly duplicates other content already in that spot (rate/comment)
* Spot duplicates an existing spot (report)
* Spot seems silly, unnecessary (comment)
* Spot name contains errors atau isn't precise (comment)
* Spot is offensive atau obscene (report)
* Image is low quality, has no description, and/or fails to have image credits (rate/comment)
* Image has no image credits and anda know the copyright belongs to someone else (report)
* Soapbox artikel presents a ridiculous opinion (rate)
* Soapbox artikel filled with grammatical, spelling and/or logic errors (rate)
* Soapbox artikel shorter than a full page (rate)
* Soapbox artikel consists of text from another site/source (report)
* Soapbox artikel has no pictures (rate)
* Pick has no pictures (comment)
* Pick does not allow users to add jawapan that are clearly necessary (comment)
* Pick is not related to the spot topic (report)
* Pick contains offensive/obscene text/images (report)
* Pick is biased/one-sided (comment)
* The video in a kuiz soalan doesn't work (report)
* anda don't like a particular pop kuiz soalan (comment)
* There are spelling errors in a pop kuiz soalan atau answer(s) (comment)
* There are factual errors in a pop kuiz question/answer (report)
* There is no way to know the answer for a pop kuiz soalan (report)

Reporting and comments
To file a lapor on something, look for the little "flag" icon. This is located in different places, depending on what anda are reporting. Click on the flag, and a sub-menu will appear, along with a text field for "comments". IMPORTANT: EVERY lapor SHOULD HAVE A COMMENT! Note, however, that the user interface is poorly designed - anda must type the komen BEFORE clicking the type of report, even though the komen-komen box is under the lapor buttons. Why comment? It is VERY likely that the staff atau admins who review the reports on a telah diberi hari will not immediately understand WHY anda reported a piece of content, and if it's not immediately obvious, it may not receive any action. It's that simple.

Types of Reports
Broadly speaking, there are three types of reports anda can file as a Fanpop user.

* Spot reporting: anda can file a lapor on a particular spot. To lapor a spot, look for and click the red flag and the word "report" just below the spot's banner in the upper right. This will open the reporting sub-menu.


* User reporting: anda can file a lapor on a particular user. To lapor an user, click on the user's name to go to the user's profil page. In the left column, labeled "about me", you'll see a bunch of information: the user's profil pictures, name, country, kegemaran films, books, et cetera. Under that, there will be several links, including one with the red flag and the words "Report Abuse". Click that link to open up the reporting sub-menu.

* Link reporting: anda can file a lapor on a particular piece of content on the site. There are eight kinds of content which anda can lapor on Fanpop: links, videos, images, soapbox articles, pop kuiz questions, picks, jawapan and komen-komen (Note: only komen-komen in a forum atau jawapan to an Answer Request can be reported as of 25 December 2009). With each, you'll be looking for a grey, unlabeled flag, in the locations described here:

With links, the flag is located just under and to the left of the ratings bar.


With videos, the flag is located just under the ratings bar.


The flag for imej is located (as with the video flag) just under the ratings bar.

With kuiz questions, the reporting flag is located on the right, between the soalan and the senarai of answers.


The flag for artikel-artikel is just under the tajuk of the article, far to the left of the ratings bar:


The flag for picks is on the right, where the ratings bar would be if anda could rate picks:


The flag for jawapan is below the soalan and the "answer this question" button:


The flag for komen-komen is below the komen itself:


What the reports mean
When anda click the flag, a sub-menu will appear, prompting anda to select which kind of lapor anda wish to file. These choices vary slightly, depending on which kind of lapor anda are filing. To file a report, anda must click on one of the red boxes, selecting one of the categories of reports.
If anda change your mind and don't want to click any of the reports, anda can always click the green "don't report" box in the sub-menu instead.


When anda lapor a SPOT, there are four possible reports:
The spot inappropriate lapor specifically means a violation of the link. This includes obscene content, spam content, hate speech content, as well as copyrighted content. A spot dedicated to "Robbing Banks" would merit an inappropriate report, as would spots dedicated to "Sex chat", "Downloading mp3s for free" and anything involving a racial slur.

The spot offensive lapor means content that anda find offensive. It may not be obscene atau a clear violation of the Terms of Service, but anda find it offensive. "Defeating Atheism" might be a spot to lapor as offensive.

The spot miscategorized lapor means that the spot is catalogued in the wrong channel. For instance, if a spot dedicated to the Lynx web browser were to be listed as part of the "Travel & Places" channel, one would be well-justified in filing a miscategorized spot report.

The spot duplicate lapor means that the spot's topic is already covered sejak another spot that was created beforehand, atau that the reported spot's topic is insufficiently different from an existing spot to merit a separate spot. A "Fanpop Kids" spot would likely be reported as a duplicate of the "Parenting" spot, for instance, and a "Great car commercials" spot would be reported as a duplicate to the "Car Commercials" spot.


When anda lapor USERS, there are three possible reports:

The user spam lapor means that the user is clearly on Fanpop for the sole purpose of trying to sell a product atau service to the other users. An user whose only contributions are to a spot he created for "Greatest Video Downloads", including a link to the site greatestvideodownloads.com and a soapbox artikel describing how great the same web site is, is an example of an user who should be reported as a spammer.

The user offensive content lapor indicates that anda feel that the user in soalan is regularly posting offensive content to the site, across many spots. An user who posts pautan to a blog called "Why your beliefs are stupid" to all the faith-oriented spots would be reported with this flag.

The user abusive lapor indicates that the user in soalan is abusive to anda and/or other Fanpop users on the site. An user who regularly rates all your content as a 1 might get an abusive report, as well as an user who regularly posts attacking komen-komen in response to your comments, as well as an user who belittles someone's opinions, intelligence, appearance and so forth.


When anda lapor CONTENT, there are five types of reports anda can file:

The content broken lapor indicates that the content link does not work. This should be filed anytime a link goes to a page that doesn't exist, a link goes to a completely different page than what the link described, atau (in the case of videos) the video in soalan has been removed from the host web site. NOTE: a video link is NOT BROKEN if it doesn't play embedded on Fanpop but does work on the host web site. Some video hosting web sites - YouTube springs to mind - allow their users to specify whether their video may play embedded atau not. If the video cannot play embedded, it will tunjuk up as normal on Fanpop, but anda must click the video's title (or the little Arrow link seterusnya to it) to go to the hosting web site and see the video. It is only when the video does not work embedded AND it does not work on the sumber site that anda should file a "broken" lapor for a video.

NOTE: pop kuiz soalan do not have a broken lapor option. Instead, they are the only type of content to have a bad question reporting option. The bad soalan flag is used to both indicate when a question's video link is broken (it doesn't play embedded atau on the sumber site) and/or to indicate that the soalan is incorrect (that is, if the soalan is wrong). It is also appropriate to use this lapor if a soalan requires the user to guess, not because anda don't know the answer, but because there is no way for anda to know the answer. For example, a soalan that asks "What is my kegemaran color?" is a valid soalan only if that information is available on Fanpop. A soalan "What is the population of country X?" would be a bad question, but a soalan "What was the population of country X in 2008?" would be valid, because it can be validated.

The content inappropriate lapor indicates that the content violates the link in some way. Among other things, this includes sexually explicit imagery, video that contain obscene language, imej without proper copyright credits that clearly were created sejak someone other than the user, and soapbox artikel-artikel that consist in large part (if not their entirety) of text that was copied from some other site (ie, plagiarism).

The content outdated lapor indicates that the content (usually a link) points to a site describing an event that has already occurred atau a deal that has expired. A link to a site where anda can sign up for free e-mail kemaskini on the 5th season of "Big Brother" would be appropriate to flag as outdated.

The content spam lapor indicates that the content is trying to sell something to the Fanpop users viewing it. This one is a little tricky, because most web sites are trying to sell something. But a link to, say, a dating service web site would not be spam if some of the site could be used for free, but would be spam if anda had to pay money up front to actually get to any content on the site.

The content miscategorized lapor means that the content has nothing to do with the spot in which it is found, atau that there's a better spot for it. A video link to Michael Jackson's HIStory in the link spot would be miscategorized, for instance. That one is obvious, but this lapor can also be pretty tricky. Would a picture of Carly Simon, who didn't tour atau produce any albums in the 1980s (but who was at least alive in the 80s) be miscategorized if it was placed in the link, instead of the link? Would video of Fanpop users' children be miscategorized if they were placed in the link rather than the link? Would an artikel describing how to be kind to our fellow users be miscategorized if found in the link, rather than the link atau link spots? There is some leeway; when in doubt, anda can always try sending a message to the user who telah diposkan the content which may be miscategorized to discuss it with him/her.

A note on multiple reports
Just a quick note: Fanpop remembers the reports that anda submit. So don't try to swamp content with reports, because the site will only allow anda to lapor a telah diberi item once. Any further attempts will be met with the reply "You have already reported this as a <report type> <spot/user/link>".

What happens to reports
So you've found some content that doesn't work in some fashion and have reported it. What happens then?

Reports that users file appear in a senarai for the site staff and moderators to address. In many cases, the reason that the lapor was filed will be obvious to them, and the staff and/or moderators will take the appropriate action. However, in many cases it is apparently not obvious why a lapor was filed, because the moderators will occasionally contact the person who filed the lapor via a message, asking for clarification. Then, once they've investigated what the reason was for the report, they will take whatever action they deem necessary. Such action includes chastising users, moving miscategorized content, banning users, merging spots, deleting spots, and deleting other content.

In addition, if the lapor was a "broken" content report, a message is also generated to the user who telah diposkan the content originally, with the subject line "One of your pautan has been flagged sejak another user." In the case of broken content, the user who telah diposkan the content originally usually has two days to sunting the link and replace it with a working link before the broken link is completely removed from the site.

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Here's pautan to other parts of the guide for your quick reference:

* link

* 1: link

* 2: link.

* 3: link

* 4: Picks: this is the generic name both for the tinjauan soalan that anda see on the site and for the jawapan anda can pick to that question. Papa has created a link.

* 5: link

* 6: link

* 7: link

anda may also want to see:

* link feature

* link