Intentions

It is very important that all users of cluster.dk understand the intentions in the system. When these intentions are understood 100%, there should be no reason to read the Rules. However, we recommend ALL users to read the rules carefully. cluster.dk is a notification system. Via cluster.dk you can notify friends - infact all cluster subscribers - about interesting DX. cluster.dk has many users from many countries. It is very important to cluster.dk, that all members are respected, accepted and they feel welcome. cluster.dk is for ALL, no matter what club, race or religion they belong to. Therefore we have some rules about how to act, what to do, and what NOT to do for all users. When these few rules and respected, there is room for everybody. Abuse of the system in any way is not accepted. Jokes etc. wil only devaluate the seriousity of our system - and this is not wanted. cluster spots has 2 purposes: 1. To notify members about a station active NOW - so members get a chance to work the station NOW. 2. To place the information in the Archive. Then all members can search in the Archive in order to find information. Purpose number one is the main purpose of cluster.dk. Therefore spots must be made as soon as possible, and best while the QSO in ongoing. This gives most users a chance to work the interesting (and spottet) station. It is very difficult to define what an "interesting station" is. What is interesting for you might be very un-interesting for other users - and visa versa. Therefore: Use your common sense. If a station has been spottet 10 times within 60 minutes from your own DXCC there might not be any reason for you to spot as well. Only for statistic reasons "old spots" are accepted - and only if the spot has a general interest. We recommend all users to read the rules very carefully and ask Administrator if there are rules not understood.

1.	Behaviour This is a general Rules and made in order to secure, that all users behave as they would abong all other people - and if the system was THEIR system. As most users behave 100% correct, you can normally do like they do... In case of problems in any way, please alklways contact Administrator. Experience shows that this gives the best results.

2.	Spots In order to have a true and serious system, we do under no circumstances accept spots not being 100% valid - with true and intereseting information. Spots are sent to over 1,000 users. There is absolutely no good reason to alert them with a spot - made only for test. E-mail address tests can be made via cluster.dk Test Center. Then only you will recieve the e-mail. cluster.dk works very well. However, if you believe there are problems with the system Administrator will be the ONLY ONE able to fix it. Therefore you should contact Administrator if you belive there are problems... The is no reason to spots stations, that are not active. Reporting fake stations only attracts attention to the fake station. Therefore, please do no report fake stations.

3.	HAM related info cluster.dk does not want to provoke the HAM-society. Some 11-meter activity is not leagal in all countries worldwide, and in order not to provoke we believe it is better NOT to write about HAM-communication at all - at cluster.dk. The HAM-society has their own systems - like cluster.dk - where you can envolve yourself in HAM- debates, in case you are interested in this. We have seen examples where 11-meter operators safety has been in danger, and the less fuss there is related to HAM-bands, the better. The spot-section do not accept frequencies outside 11-meter band.This is also made to prevent spots reporting stations at other bands....
4.	Respect cluster.dk is a nice place to be... And it must continue in this way. Problems, sword, negative words, bad vibrations etc. are therefore not accepted. We belive it is very important to "gather" 11-meter in order to make friendsship. And ship we want........

5.	Comments The text in the comment-field for reported spots wil be sent to all stations receiveing the spot. Many users are receiving the spots as SMS at their mobile telephone (GSM, cellular phone). SMS only contains 160 characters and therefore comments must be short. In order to have a serious and professional cluster, all text must be serious. To secure all users understand the spots, cluster.dk is an system for English language. We have translated some information into other languages. This is a service to our users. This does not mean, that we still are not a system using only English language. cluster.dk is a nice place to be. Therefore words like "sh**" are not accepted.

6.	Validity ALL information must be 100 valid. In case of invalided e-mail addresses, acounts will be shut down emmidiately. This is to secure a smooth running system. If cluster.dk sends spots to an e-mail address rejected by ISP (Internet Service Providor, the e-mail is returned to Administrator. Administrator will then emmidiately close the account!! All spots must be trustworthy and valid. This is to secure a high standard and seriousity at the system. If a fake station is heard, please do NOT report the station. A report will only attract even more attention to him - which is exactly what he is looking for..... Therefore : Do NOT make spots for fake stations. Instead spread the news via maialinglists - and maybe use the MessageBoard to tell about the fake. A spot is sent to many users, and there is no reason to bother them with spots concerning fake stations. Only spots where ALL information is valid and true must be made. Else the spot is worthless.

7.	Callsigns In order to have as short callsigns as possible, the defined standard must be used. Long callsigns is a problem at the MessageBoard, because it takes up too much space. And space is something that is not much of. Callsigns are also sent in the spots, and with oyly 160 characters at SMS, we must use short callsigns. Callsigns are also used at the Archive. To use the Archive in best possible way, we must use a reasonable standard, so we easy and fast can search in the Archive.

8.	Information We see clubs trying to copy our system and use our data. These clubs only want to share their data (spots) with their own members. This is bad for 11-meter community because members of other clubs can not have access to these data. cluster.dk believe in an "open" and friendly community for ALL of 11-meter. Unfortunately many clubs do not believe in the same ideas as we do. When formats/colours of our Iframes are changed, we cannot guarantee a high and professional standard and that the Iframes are working 100%.

9.	Behaviour It is important to us, that cluster.dk is a professional and serious system. These rules are made in order to have this kind of system.

10.	Bouncing mail cluster.dk sends more than 3 mill. spots ( = e-mails) every week. When e-mails are not delivered to correct recipient they are returned to Administrator. Therefore all e-mail addresses must be valid. Normally there are no reason to have multiple profiles. The profiles QRZ (callsign) can be changed at "change user info"-page.

11.	PR - Public Relations cluster.dk is system for all users - and must continue this way. We cannot make PR in any way, except via our banner rotation system and link-page. If we all post PR-messages as blindpostings, the Messageboard would be flooded with irrelevant information, and no one would see the "real" postings. We have over 3.500 messages every single day, and with blindpostings as well, we estimate that we soon would have over 10,000 messages every day. Every single message needs to be sent to all users online, often over 200 users, and this takes bandwith. Bandwith is expensive - and a lot of bandwith is very expensive...

12.	Patience Administrator will answer mails as fast as possible. Please respect, that Administrator might be away from home for several days due to business travel. Most questions can be answered by reading cluster.dk FAQ - As Administrator receive a lot of mail every day, we ask all to read FAQ before mailing Administrator. Thanks.

13.	Acceptance In case you cannot accept the terms of using cluster.dk, please delete your profile emmidiately.

	Specific Rules for MessageBoard
14.	English Dialogue in other languages than English might provoke other users. Therefore we accept dialogue in only one language: English. In general we do not accept non English language at all, however single words like "ciao" etc. are normally tolerated in case they are no part of a dialogue in another language.

15.	Spots Spots made via the MessageBoard are only read by those users being online - and reading the MessageBoard. All spots must be sent via the spot-section (the buttom "Report new spot".) It is not acceptable to use the MessageBoard for spots (A spot is received by up to several thousand users - a message at the Messageboard is only read by the users reading messages online at the cluster). As we have a very good cluster-section, this has to be used for questions.

16.	General usage cluster.dk is nice and friendly place to be - and must stay in that way A: We want to have a nice and friendly site B: Fight will allways provoke and are therefore totally un-accepted C: Patronized words are not friendly D: We want to have a nice and friendly site E: Jokes/Irony can/will very easily be misunderstood nd then cause problems F: Discussions in general can cause problems, and the mentioned kind of discussions can/will cause problems for sure... G: Most 11-meter operators has no problems with local "Radio Police" (FCC), probably because they do not mix up with commercial radio communication and HAM-communication. We know as a fact that our site is heavily monitored by HAMS and to secure the safety of all our users, discussions and comments about HAM-activities are not accepted H: Swearing will hurt other users

17.	Discussions Discussion and irony might be understood by some users in a negative way, and is thereby not accepted.

18.	Acceptance Abuse will cause expulsion from cluster.dk and related sites immediately, without warning and without explaining information.