As we enter a new school year, the News has tweaked the user policy governing how comments will be moderated on the website.

Under this new policy, comments will be removed if they are judged to be off-topic, incoherent or inappropriate. Unless they contain an inaccurate quotation of the News’ reporting, comments will never be edited for content; instead, they will either be accepted in full or removed from the site. Some decisions will necessarily be subjective, but we will do our utmost to be careful and consistent in our moderating.

The full user policy is below:

Yaledailynews.com readers may sign up for a website account by clicking “Sign up” on the home page. An account allows users to post comments on all website content, as well as to subscribe to the News’ email editions and alerts.

In order to receive an account, users must enter a valid email address; we will not spam you or give your email address to anybody.

Comments are automatically posted on the website, but comments that violate this policy can and will be removed. Users may flag certain comments for removal by clicking the link “suggest removal” under a specific comment.

The ability to comment on yaledailynews.com is provided as a service to users, and our goal is that they are a place for readers to exchange intelligent and informed thoughts that promote constructive conversations about the news. To that end, we will remove comments that we believe violate the yaledailynews.com user policy. Comments will not be edited unless they contain an inaccurate quotation from the Yale Daily News; they will either be accepted or removed from the site.

Comments will not be removed as long as they are on-topic and not abusive, but our decisions are subjective. We will do our utmost to be careful and consistent in moderating.

A comment violates the yaledailynews.com user policy if it contains:

  • off-topic, incoherent or inappropriate remarks;
  • personal attacks, threats or foul language (including expletives and letters followed by dashes);
  • advertisements or other spam;
  • impersonations;
  • or if it targets or otherwise singles out a Yale Daily News staff member.