Conditions of forum use

The discussion areas are provided by the Institution of Engineering and Technology, in order to assist its members and others in exchanging views on current issues and matters of common interest. Please observe the following rules and guidelines when posting messages.

This forum is owned and operated by the IET. Users take part in the discussions by permission of the IET. That permission may be withdrawn at any time, at the sole discretion of the IET, and without further justification being necessary. In particular, messages may be removed or accounts banned if, in the opinion of the moderators, this is in the best interests of technical and professional discussions in the forums.

  1. The discussion area is intended for short postings in line with the purposes mentioned above. Substantial technical submissions should be sent to our editorial department, for possible inclusion in our publications, including E&T Magazine.
  2. The discussion areas may not be used for the promotion of products and services of any kind, nor for recruitment advertising; potential advertisers are invited to contact our Advertising Department. However, this condition should not discourage users from suggesting a product that may assist a genuine enquirer who has raised a specific problem. In such circumstances, users should obey the custom among professional engineers of declaring any interest.
  3. Please do not post the same message to multiple forums. This practice leads to replies from others being distributed in several locations, and therefore diminishes the usefulness of the discussions to all concerned.
  4. IET members and other participants in this forum are happy to share their experience. However, you are more likely to get a helpful response if you can show, from your question, that you have already made reasonable efforts to investigate the problem yourself. For example, enquiries from students who have difficulties with a particular aspect of an assignment are generally welcomed. By contrast, those who simply submit the entire problem and request a solution may find that busy working engineers do not give their time so willingly.
  5. Messages, whether posted by IET members or others, should comply with the relevant sections of the Institution's rules of conduct. This includes, but is not limited to, those rules that concern objectiveness, concern for the reputation of others, declaration of interest, and the making of statements outside one's area of professional expertise. In the context of a discussion forum, this stipulation is not intended to prevent the offering of informal suggestions, provided that it is clear on what basis these are made. Under no circumstances may defamatory statements be made in these forums. The use of swearing, or of offensive language or links, is not in the spirit of the rules and will not be permitted.
  6. Users are reminded that text, images and other information created by third parties will be subject to the laws of copyright, and that this includes material found elsewhere on the Internet. Messages posted to the discussion area must not include such material without the copyright owner's permission, and links to other sites should comply with those sites' conditions for such links.
  7. Discussion postings are subject to the terms of the IET's legal and copyright statement.
  8. The IET reserves the right to remove messages at its discretion. In addition, a message may be moved to another area of the discussions if, in the view of the webmaster, the message is more relevant to that area.
  9. However, the responsibility for the content of messages rests with the authors. The IET makes no warranty with respect to the validity of the information supplied in messages, and readers should make their own assessments before using such information.
  10. It is expected that contributors will register one account only, and in doing so will provide genuine names and contact details, in order to take responsibility for the messages that they post.
    The IET considers any user account registration set up with a temporary or disposable email address as a breach of this condition.  Accounts that do not meet this condition may be denied permission to post or may be deleted along with any associated messages. If you complete an IET Engineering Communities online user profile, other logged in users will be able to view your profile and interact with you, therefore only complete this section if you are happy for users to view your profile.
  11. Logged-in users may use the facility to report messages to the moderator where they appear to conflict with these conditions. Alternatively, please contact the webmaster.

Reviewed 10/02/2016 (clarified rule 10 regarding temporary / disposable email addresses )