Community guidelines

Last modified on Dec 12, 2018

What we have in mind for our Vent community

Self-expression
Vent is the place for you to express yourself.  Sharing your thoughts and feelings helps you chill out and lift your mood.

Supporting each other
Life throws us many surprises. Vent strives to create a safe and supportive space where people help each other navigate through life’s rough waters by sharing feelings and experiences. Your expression generates energy that may inspire others embarking on their own journey of self-discovery and happiness.

Enrichment
We want every experience on vent to add value to your life – be it gaining a new perspective, discovering a passion, influencing people for social change, satisfaction through helping others or refining the art of articulating your feelings or opinions. We want Vent to be a place for you to grow.

Fun
Explore, exchange views, reflect and meet new people. Importantly we want you to have lots of fun and laughter – this is a great way to relieve stress and help make your worries fly away.  Humour and playful communication brings people together, helps overcome challenges and inspires hope.  Seek out the numerous uplifting people that have found a place on Vent or explore the lighter emotions for a powerful and instant boost.

Privacy
Vent respects the importance of social gatherings that take place away from the prying eyes of those that you may know.   We believe that you should have control over how you interact with our community.  You may choose to expand your horizons, sharing emotions or experimenting with different personalities, with interesting people from all around the world.  If you are after something more familiar then inviting your friends from your personal life or connections from other social networks may be the way to go.  An even more intimate experience is also achievable for those that would rather surround themselves with trusted listeners or simply use the app as a personal journal.

What Vent expects from you
Contribute according to our community values:

  •         Caring
  •         Honesty
  •         Restraint
  •         Responsibility
  •         Respect

Develop your identity:

  •         Build confidence
  •         Self-Esteem
  •         Sense of Purpose
  •         Cultural awareness
  •         Positive View of Personal Future

Why we have Community Guidelines
While Vent encourages you to freely express who you really are, we also strive to foster a positive and supportive community that values the wellbeing of all our users.

These guidelines establish the boundaries for the content and behaviours that we expect – to avoid any confusion:

Respect the Vent community
Vent is a place where different people from all over the globe can come to share emotions and the most personal of moments so we are unwavering in our determination to foster a respectful and understanding community.  In order to preserve people’s safety and promote respect, Vent may delete your content or issue bans without prior notice if you harass, threaten, stalk or attempt to humiliate or publicly shame others. The use of hate speech is also not acceptable on the platform.

Vent asks our community to exist harmoniously and embrace the richness of diversity. The below content will not be tolerated on Vent:

  • Users wishing serious harm, death or disease/illness upon others.
  • Users sharing content that praises, glorifies, promotes, and/or supports any hateful ideology.
  • Racist content will not be tolerated on the platform. Vent defines racism as prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism by an individual, community, or institution against a person or people on the basis of their membership of a particular racial or ethnic group, typically one that is a minority or marginalised.

Vent asks that you DO NOT call out, name drop or shame other users that have interacted with you in a manner which makes you uncomfortable.  Privacy features such as the ability to Block a user or set your account to Private are at your disposal and should be used in such circumstances.  If you still feel that a user is deliberately spamming or harassing you, the in-app reporting system is the correct way to ensure this matter is brought to our immediate attention.

Self-injury, Suicide & Unhealthy Behaviours
Sharing on Vent needs to be safe for everyone. When it comes to self-harm we know this is a really personal topic but there are legal requirements for what we can allow and what needs to be moderated.  We do not allow any content that encourages or promotes self harm, suicide or other harmful behaviours including eating disorders. Content that may be triggering or harmful to other users will be removed.

We do allow users to share their experiences of these issues and seek support in a way that is safe for everyone in the community. If users are struggling with these issues, we would encourage them to share how they’re feeling, any coping strategies and suggest how others can help. Please make sure that these discussions are tagged correctly.

  • Do not post any content that promotes, encourages, coordinates or provides instructions for Suicide, Self-harm or any other harmful behaviours including eating disorders.
  • Any content containing graphic description or images of self harm or suicide is prohibited. This includes any suggestion of planning for suicide or any methodologies that might be used.
  • Any content promoting eating disorders including dangerous weight loss is prohibited. Descriptions of eating disorder behaviours, sharing tips, coaching advice, or specific measures (calories, weight, BMI, body measurements etc.) will be removed.
  • Content asking for medical advice about medication will be removed. This includes referencing the name and dosage of medications.
  • Content promoting any other harmful behaviours will be removed.

We ask that Vent users add a trigger warning to any posts containing content around the subjects of suicide, self-harm and eating disorders. A trigger warning can be enabled within the in app ‘post options’. Content that is deemed unsafe and not appropriately tagged will be removed.

Vent is not an emergency service, and we’re not able to help with immediate crisis situations. If you’re experiencing thoughts of harming yourself and you’re not sure if you can keep yourself safe, Vent might not be the right place for you. If you’re in a life-threatening situation, please call emergency services or go to your nearest emergency department. You can also check out the ‘I need help’ section in the sidebar of the Vent app or check out the services here – https://www.talklife.co/get-professional-help-now

Trigger warnings
Trigger warnings help users avoid the content they prefer not to see and help contribute to users’ safety on Vent, so we require users to tag certain content with a trigger warning before the post goes live. We require users to tag the following content with a trigger warning:

  • not-safe-for-work (NSFW)/explicit content
  • Self-injury & unhealthy behaviours
  • Suicide

Users are only required to tag posts if they include the content above. If you believe your post could be upsetting to others, you are encouraged to include a trigger warning. If in doubt, please enable a trigger warning using the appropriate toggle within the post options.

NSFW

Vent allows certain posts that contain sexually explicit content, however such content must be correctly tagged as ‘NSFW’ (Not Safe For Work) and must not violate the below rules:

  • Illegal, violent or content promoting the normalisation of sexual assault and non-consensual violence associated with sexual acts is prohibited. This includes but is not limited to the glorification and fantasy of; or the support of rape, sexual assault, violent/gore & graphic fantasies, paedophilia, incest, bestiality, necrophilia and any other non-consensual or abusive sexual actions, including the fictional portrayal of these actions.
  • Any links to pornographic content is prohibited.
  • Content depicting excessively gratuitous gore is prohibited.
  • Any content that sexually exploits minors is prohibited.
  • Other users cannot be tagged in NSFW posts.

Users under the age of 18 are restricted from viewing or interacting with NSFW content. If it becomes apparent that a user is navigating this restriction by providing a false date of birth, their account may be permanently banned from the platform. Minors are unable to post NSFW content and do not have access to the NSFW tag. If it becomes apparent that a minor is posting NSFW content, the content will be removed.

NSFW content can only be posted in +18 groups labelled as NSFW. If content is posted within groups not marked as NSFW, we will suspend or ban that user, depending on the nature of the content.

Unsolicited NSFW content is not permitted in direct messages. If unsolicited NSFW content is sent via a direct message, we will suspend or ban that user, dependant on the nature of the content.

Abide by the law

Illegal content will be immediately removed from the platform – content posted on Vent must not:

  • Incite illegal behaviour or violence
  • Support or encourage terrorism or hate groups
  • Share material that sexually exploits minors
  • Constitute fraudulent activity, including obtaining or attempting to obtain financial advantage or private information by deception

Unacceptable profile pictures & gallery images
For the comfort of all Vent users, Vent does not allow the use of profile pictures or gallery images that include:

  • genitalia
  • nipples
  • suggestive stances/poses in underwear
  • semi nudity
  • graphic self harm images
  • pornography
  • gore
  • guns
  • promotion of violence

Before uploading a profile picture or gallery image, consider whether it would be appropriate for a complete stranger or minor to view. Users as young as 16 may see your profile picture, so if it is not appropriate for this age range, it does not belong on Vent. Profile pictures or gallery images that are deemed unacceptable will be removed or replaced with a generic image. Repeated breaches of this guideline will result in your account being removed without further notice.

Other important behaviours that will not be tolerated on Vent

  • Call out posts or name dropping. This rule is in place to prevent the spread of misinformation and keep users safe as we cannot verify the information in those posts. Please use the in-app report feature instead of report users who breach our guidelines. Users who breach this rule will face an immediate suspension.
  • Vent is not a dating app. We do allow some user-created groups that discuss dating to remain in the app. These groups must be marked as explicit and are strictly 18+ spaces.
  • Creating Groups with a sole purpose of being offensive or hateful towards any gender, religion, sexual orientation or other minorities
  • Raiding of groups by posting irrelevant, off-topic, provocative or abusive content
  • Spam, scams or other forms of solicitation. We do not allow users to solicit money for personal use, including links to personal GoFundMe, PayPal, Cash App etc.
  • Copying Vent posts & comments to other sites without prior consent from the original content creator
  • Posting gore or pornographic material
  • Automated or programmatic methods of creating Vent accounts, posting content or boosting your interaction button numbers
  • Username hoarding. Owning a few active accounts for various purposes is welcomed however registering and saving usernames in large volumes will not be tolerated. Devices with 20 or more active accounts registered may face an immediate ban.
  • Selling usernames. Breaching this rule will result in an instant ban.
  • Account sharing. Do not share your account details. If we identify that account sharing has occurred when addressing support requests, we will close the ticket.
  • Harassment or abuse directed towards users, volunteers or Vent staff.
  • Respect our systems – do not interfere with or disrupt the Site or the servers or networks connected to the Site

Flagging inappropriate content on Vent

To Flag a Post in Vent for admin review, please follow the below steps:

  1. Open the inappropriate post from the feed
  2. Press the ‘. . .’ in the top right hand corner of the screen
  3. Choose a reason for flagging the content
  4. You will not be notified of any further action

To Flag a Comment in Vent for admin review, please follow the below steps:

  1. Open the inappropriate comment from the feed
  2. Press the ‘. . .’ in the top right hand corner of the comment
  3. Choose a reason for flagging the content
  4. You will not be notified of any further action

To Flag a Direct Message in Vent for admin review, please follow the below steps:

  1. Select the settings icon in the top right of the messaging thread.
  2. Choose “report user”
  3. Select a reason for flagging the conversation