Hello. My son Noah has been using Reptile Rooms for about a year (user ID: noahboa1). He apparently recently noted in a post that he is 11 years old, and has since been banned with the reason "underage - TOS violation." Noah has not and does not use your forum without parental knowledge. The sign-up screen shows the following text: Noah did and continues to have parental consent to use the forum. I have found your site to be a relatively reputable and trustworthy source of information and well-managed with respect to "family appropriate" content. While I have not participated in every one of Noah's activities here, I have monitored periodically. I reviewed the TOS with Noah and your sign-up screen appears to contradict your written TOS. I'm hoping that you will consider reactivating his account, as he places a lot of value in the community at Reptile Rooms, which he feels he is a part of. He is fairly responsible for his age and I am not aware of any inappropriate behavior on his part. If there was some other action by Noah which led to the deactivating of his account, please let me know so that I may discuss it with him. If it is simply his age, please explain why his account was deactivated, considering the information on your registration screen. He doesn't understand and I don't have any answers for him. Thank you for your time and consideration on this matter.
I believe there are parental consent papers you can work out with CheriS who is the owner of this site. Its a legal matter, children under 13 need to have parental permission (usually a form the parents note and sign, and fax back). This practice stems from the COPA (Childrens Online Protection Act) and while made to make the internet safer, I know that for kids like Noah (and my self, I had the same problem as a kid) its a pain. I had personal correspondence with your son, he's a very smart kid for 11, I would have thought he was older. I hope this gets straightened out soon he's a pleasure to speak with!
I also spoke with Noah, it was one of my threads of which he revealed his age. By reading what he was planning on doing with his reptiles, he seems to be a very responsible kid. He's a lot more responsible than what I've seen with some grown adults who have mistreated/neglected their reptiles. I would've never guessed he was 11 either.
I believe Cheri is the only person who can sort this out. I will make sure she sees this thread. She is very busy right now, so please be patient. We'll get it taken care of as quickly as possible.
I believe there was also an issue of him inviting the mods here to come be mods at his site, as well as contacting other members in private and inviting them to his site after he was informed that it's against the rules. I don't know more details about it that that, so I'll direct Cheri and the mod who brought this to our attention to this thread and they can explain it.
I would be happy to review and sign parental consent papers if needed. On the issue of Noah looking for "mods" and inviting others to an outside site - I will explain this to him. Let me know if you have more detail. I hope that isn't something worthy of a permanent ban from the forum. Noah is not only learning about reptile management, but also about Internet ettiquette. His animal forum site is no threat to the Reptile Rooms whatsoever. He was very eager to try having his own forum site and did all the work himself. Though I was doubtful he would be able to gather many members (he has two so far, one of whom is me...) since he didn't have any real source of unique content, I chose not to quash his enthusiasm. He may learn something about the reality of Internet forums, or who knows, perhaps it will take off and become a companion to this and other informational forum sites. I understand that Cheri is busy and will patiently await her attention. Lastly, thank you for the positive comments regarding Noah's participation here. I already know he's a great kid, but I'm biased so it's nice to have the occasional confirmation! Regards, Eric
Hello, yes there was an issue of him inviting mods to his site, but also spamming and PMing people asking for them to join his site. While his intentions may be good, i do ask you to understand that spamming is something that we do not tolerate here. I was the mod who dealt with this but we do generally (unless under extreme circumstances) give people second chances and warnings. When we found his age, we were legally obliged to prevent his access to this forum. Yes, there are parental consent forms which i will enquire about for you, and see if i can sort these out a little quicker than you'll be waiting for a response from Cheri. It still probably won't be until at least the weekend, but i will speak with her and try to obtain these forms for you. Kind regards, Luke
No rush. Perhaps several days "suspension" will help underscore the point that he needs to be aware of the rules with regard to anything that may be construed as spamming. I am quite certain that he will learn from this experience, whatever the outcome. Thanks again, Eric
Admin does not discuss reasons for banning in the public forums. I will welcome a PM from the person or their parents, but had not received one
As a parent, I find COPPA to be exceptionally annoying, but it is a federal law, and thus we don't have any choice but to comply with it. (Sending in written permission so my kids can use an internet forum is absolutely ridiculous, IMO--I don't remember being asked whether I wanted to do that, lol). COPPA: Children Obviously Pretending Permitted Ages.
So if my cousin joined a forum when he was twelve and is now 14 would he be banned if he told the site admin, or said somewhere on his forum that he was twelve when he joined?
