The following describes the various policy and procedures used by this
web site. It is expected that all users adhere to and understand what is
stated below. Failure to do so may result in removal of the offending
user's ID.
This website intends to be relatively family-friendly. As such, all
public areas of the site should free of blatant offensive words and
slurs. This includes the Tribal Council Message Board as well as
user nicknames and private team names (as they may show up on leaderboards).
It's not my intent to make the site squeakly clean, either. Certainly
there are humorous puns and innuendos that relate to Survivor or the
participants in the game. Let's just not be blatant about it. If you
have any questions about the appropriateness of a name or words, please
ask the administrator.
Tribal Council Message Board: The Tribal Council Message Board
is a public message board. Offensive language and personal attacks
will not be tolerated in posts to this board. Offending posts will be
deleted. Repeated offensive posting will result in removal of the poster's
account.
Private Team Message Boards: These message boards are your private
forum area. Generally the restrictions on posts in these boards are
completely up to your team commissioner. I look to team commissioners
to set the rules of conduct for your private team area. Team
commissioners should contact the administrator if they wish to have
messages removed or user accounts removed (they can banish a player from
a team themselves if they wish).
"Cheating": Lance's Survivor Pick'Em welcomes users that research
their votes each week. I only ask that these players declare themselves
as "cheaters" so as to be ranked on a level playing field with other
researchers and not with those players that do not want to spoil their
viewing of the show with knowledge of inside information.
For lack of a better word, I chose to use the word "cheating" to
describe the practice of researching votes. I simply like the way
it sounds as in "Cheaterboard". I am not trying to be derogatory
in any way towards people that play in this way. It's all just
for fun! I am always open to suggestions for a better name if you
can think of one that sounds cool.
"Cheating" is defined as using non-official websites to do research.
The only official websites are cbs.com and this website, provided you
aren't being fed insider information within your private team area.
You are also allowed to watch the TV show itself (of course),
previews and commercials, and interviews with castoffs on shows such
as David Letterman or The Early Show (specifically on CBS). Pretty
much any other source of information is prohibited. This is not
to say that if you inadvertently overheard your friend talking
about something he read on the internet that you have to declare
yourself a cheater, but in general, if you are specifically
researching your votes, you are definitely a cheater.
I will generally leave it to your own conscience to properly
declare yourself a cheater. However, periodically I will ask
players that are doing well to read a detailed description of
what I consider cheating to be and the reasoning behind having
separate leaderboards. If, after that, they still maintain that
they are not cheating, that is fine. I have no way to prove
otherwise. However, their statements about not cheating will
be available for those that have a reason to want to inspect them.
Please e-mail the administrator for more information.
Generally speaking, once you're a "cheater", you remain a cheater
for the rest of the season. Even one week of "cheating" gives you
an advantage over those that don't. You've been tainted. So think
about this fact before you start researching for the first week.
Results: Generally results will be posted immediately after the
episode airs in the Eastern and Central time zones. However,
depending on how you have
your time zone set up, results may be embargoed at your location
until the show finishes airing in your time zone. There may be
exceptions to when results are posted: I may not be available to
post results immediately after the show; a twist introduced in the
episode may require additional programming on my part. At any rate,
all possible effort will be expended to get the results posted as
soon as possible after the show airs.
Rankings: You may notice rankings change slightly during the
week. Any time a user switches in or out of a group, the affected
group is re-ranked. Also, whenver a player changes their "cheating"
status, the entire leaderboard and cheaterboard is re-ranked.
In addition, I will switch players to "cheating" that have not
responded to my query for a statement stating that the player is not
cheating. I will generally do this on Tuesdays. This movement
may in fact adjust the rankings by as many as 10 ranks. Fortunately
on the leaderboard it is always an upward movement!
E-mail addresses: You are responsible for ensuring that your
e-mail address on the system is valid. If I get mail bounced
from e-mails sent to an invalid address, I will delete the address
on the system, and you will not receive reminder notices, message
board posts, and most importantly system notices which are very
important messages from the administrator. Furthermore, if you lose
your password, you will not be able to get it reset which means
you may have essentially lost all your points in the season thus
far.
Inactive accounts: Inactive users will continue to receive
reminder notices and message board posts for the first 4 weeks of
a new season. After that point, these e-mails will cease. At the
end of a season, if a user has not participated at all during the
season, their account will be deleted.
Privacy: I don't collect any personal information on this site
other than for purposes of running the game (i.e. I collect your
e-mail address so I can e-mail you reminder notices and message
board posts). I certainly do not share any information I collect
with anyone. Complete details are in the site's
Privacy Policy.
