Discussions that could be considered taboo in The Lounge

[sozzled]

The forum rules are fairly clear about what cannot be discussed on this forum.

• Do not discuss illegal activities. Our server is hosted in the USA and so is subject to US law. Please do not expose us to any unnecessary legal liability.
• Do not link to any site that contains adult content, sexually oriented material or might otherwise be considered offensive. Any post containing an inappropriate link will be deleted and the poster will receive a warning.
• Do not propose/link to any site that contains warez/copyrighted software/materials that can be downloaded illegally.
• Linking to extensions: If an extension (commercial or otherwise) is listed in the JED then the link from the forum must be to the approved JED listing only.
• No affiliate links to be posted, anywhere on our forum.
• No tracking links, like campaigns, are allowed on the forum.
• No commercial advertising is permitted.
• When recommending an extension or other product to help a user solve their issue, you must disclose any affiliations you may have with the company or group that authors that particular product. This includes, but is not limited to: any paid or non-paid relationships past or present, receiving any promotional products or services, or any other similar information.
• Any posts deemed to be self promotion, advertising, or spam can and will be removed. NO SPAM - NO ADVERTISING eg. Posting and making excessive, inappropriate and unnecessary references to your products and websites is self promotion.
• This is not the place to settle a commercial disagreement for custom development or to be a 'wall of shame'. Any posts deemed to be of this nature will be removed. Settle your disputes in private please.

Lastly, and perhaps most importantly:

• These forums are centered on Joomla, Open Source software and other Internet and computer matters. They are not a place to promote ideological, religious, or political matters. All such discussions will be deleted/closed.

To put it simply, when people ask "What do you recommend?" as a wide-ranging question or a question that requires someone to express their personal preference for one thing or another, these kinds of questions may result in responses that are borderline violations of the forum rules.

While I have nothing against questions like "What do you recommend?", I think many of the responses to them are (a) subjective, (b) questionable and debatable, and (c) may not be fit for purpose.

In addition to the "promotion" (or discussions/debates) about ideological, religious or political issues, we could probably add discussions about webhosting providers. Therefore, when people ask questions about webhosting providers (whether they're about commercial disputes or problems that people have with their current webhosting provider, asking for opinions about a specific webhosting provider or seeking "recommendations" for other webhosting sources), the responses to those questions often involve "ideological" differences and violate the guiding principles in how this forum should be used.

We don't have a problem with those questions. We do have a problem with the responses to those questions. This is why most of the discussion topics that one reads here on the forum are quickly locked by the forum moderators because they violate the forum rules.

Please keep this in mind when you post questions on the forum. Thank you.