Community Rules & Etiquette and Privacy

Thank you for being part of our community. To ensure the best possible experience for all members, we have established some basic guidelines for participation.

By joining and using this community, you agree that you have read and will follow these rules and guidelines. You also agree to reserve discussions and shared files and content to that best suited to the medium. This is a great medium with which to solicit the advice of your peers, benefit from their experience, and participate in an ongoing conversation. Questions should be directed to our member services department via the Contact Us link on this site.

Please take a moment to acquaint yourself with these important guidelines. If you have questions, contact the Membership and Professional Services team. In order to preserve an environment that encourages both civil and fruitful dialogue, we reserve the right to suspend or terminate membership in this community for anyone who violate these rules.

The Rules

• Respect others. Focus on the content of posts and not on the people making them. Please extend the benefit of the doubt to newer guests and members; there’s no such thing as a stupid question.

• Respect the purpose of the community. Use the community to share successes, challenges, constructive feedback, questions, and goals instead of products or services that you provide. If you’ve found a product or service helpful, please share your experience with the group in a respectful way.

• Use caution when discussing products. Information posted on the discussion groups and in the libraries is available for all to see, and comments are subject to libel, slander, and antitrust laws.

• All defamatory, abusive, profane, threatening, offensive, or illegal materials are strictly prohibited. Do not post anything that you would not want the world to see or that you would not want anyone to know came from you.

• Respect intellectual property. Post content that you have personally created or have permission to use and have properly attributed to the content creator.

• When posting items in our collaborative environment, please indicate if the item is not available for reuse. It’s also advisable to contact the owner of any material if you would like to reuse it.

• Post your message or documents only to the most appropriate communities. This helps ensure all messages receive the best response by eliminating "noise."

Discussion Group Etiquette

• State concisely and clearly the topic of your comments in the subject line. This allows members to respond more appropriately to your posting and makes it easier for members to search the archives by subject.

• Send messages such as "thanks for the information" or "me, too" to individuals, not to the entire list. Do this by using the "Reply to Sender" link in every message.

• Do not send administrative messages, such as “remove me from the list,” to the group. Instead, use the web interface to change your settings or to remove yourself from a list. If you are changing email addresses, you do not need to remove yourself from the list and rejoin under your new email address. Simply change your settings.

Terms & Conditions

Thank you for using the Peer Platform (Peer or our or we or us) – Australia’s leading online community tailored to and for members of the Australian Dental Association. 

Peer allows members to post discussions, ask questions and share interesting data with other members. 

In order to ensure that we maintain a high standard to ensure that all content posted on the Platform is relevant and intended to contribute to the Platform, we require all of our members to comply with these Community Management Guidelines (Guidelines). 

The Guidelines are intended to be read together with, and form part of, the Peer User Terms and Conditions – see above 'Community Rules & Etiquette and Privacy'.

The Guidelines are intended to make the Peer community a place where all members and users (in whatever capacity they are using the Platform) are respectful, honest and courteous in order to ensure all other users have a safe and professional experience. 

Section 1 

In order to preserve this environment, we require all members to strictly comply with and adhere to the following community rules and guidelines: 

1. Respect others: Focus on the content of posts and not on the people making them. Please extend the benefit of the doubt to newer members. Be respectful and kind to other members when communicating directly with them (whether privately or in the public forum).  
   • We do not permit content or comments that attack, intimidate, incites or threaten hatred, violence, prejudicial or discriminatory action against individuals or groups because of a protected right under Australian law, including, race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, age or disability status. 
   • We do not allow bullying or harassment on Peer – this includes abusive language, revealing personal or sensitive information or inciting, encouraging or engaging others to do the same. 
2. Respect privacy: You must not solicit, collect or request the personal or private information of other users or members, particularly if you do not know or have the consent of those individuals. You must not use the Platform to disclose or distribute on Peer any data or information obtained in violation of the User Terms. 
3. Comply with the law: At Peer, we do not condone any unlawful conduct, particularly if it is directed at a specific individual or a group of individuals. You must ensure your use of the Platform complies with all applicable laws, including, for example, privacy laws, intellectual property laws, anti-spam laws, anti-discrimination laws and other regulatory obligations. 
4. Respect the community: Use the community to share useful information, new updates or developments, successes, challenges, constructive feedback, questions, and goals instead of products or services that you provide. If you have found a product or service helpful, please share your experience with the group in a respectful way. 
5. Do not share false or misleading content or misinformation: Peer is a community for professionals working, studying or operating in the dentistry profession – we do not accept the sharing or publishing of any false or misleading content or information or any misinformation. If you know that the content you are about to submit or share is, or think may be, misleading or inaccurate, including misinformation or disinformation – do not submit or share the content. We may prevent you from posting content or information from websites or sources that are known to produce or contain misinformation. 
6. Do not engage in spam or scams: Peer does not permit the unsolicited, irrelevant, inappropriate or unauthorised repetitive messages or other content including content which is excessively commercial or promotional. Please make the effort to create original, professional, relevant, evidence-based content. 
7. Respect intellectual property: Post content that you have personally created or have permission to use and have properly attributed to the content creator. 
8. Think before you post: All defamatory, abusive, profane, threatening, offensive, or illegal materials are strictly prohibited. Do not post anything that you would not want the world to see or that you would not want anyone to know came from you. 
9. Relevance: Post your message or documents only to the most appropriate communities. This helps ensure all messages receive the best response by eliminating "noise." 
10. Be precise: State concisely and clearly the topic of your comments or post in the subject line. This allows members to respond more appropriately to your posting and makes it easier for members to search the archives by subject. 
11. Don’t forget to say ‘thanks’: Send messages such as "thanks for the information" or "me, too" to individuals, not to the entire list. Do this by using the "Reply to Sender" link in every message. 
12. Be considerate: Be considerate of others prior to posting or communicating. Do not send administrative messages, such as “remove me from the list,” to a group. Instead, use the web interface to change your settings or to remove yourself from a list. If you are changing email addresses, you do not need to remove yourself from the list and rejoin under your new email address. Simply change your settings. 
13. Respect Peer and the ADA: Ensure that in all dealings with the Peer Platform, the ADA and its staff and team members you always show respect and utmost courtesy and professionalism. Ensure that you access Peer only in the manner that it is intended to be used or otherwise as expressly authorised from time to time. 

Section 2 

Before you choose to publish any content on Peer, please take note of the following rules and guidelines: 

1. Any original content that you publish remains your work. You own the rights to those original articles or works that you publish. 
2. You can request the deletion of your content from our Platform at any time. For compliance or pursuant to any applicable law or regulation or on account of our back-up or storage requirements, we may be required to retain any and all content published on the Platform for an indefinite period. 
3. We will be permitted to share, copy, annotate and distribute your content as and when we require it. 
4. You will be responsible for the content of your articles (even if you are merely sharing another person’s article lawfully) – this includes any harm caused by you to others, and any other breach or violation of these rules and guidelines. 
5. Prior to posting or submitting any content for publishing on the Peer Platform, you must ensure that all personal information (or information which may reasonably disclose the identity of an individual) is removed from the content or that such content is fully de-identified (including indirect content, such as the name or descriptor of files being uploaded or posted). The foregoing does not apply in circumstances where the consent of such individual has been expressly obtained for the purposes of the content being posted, used or published on the Peer Platform.  
6. We will restrict, suspend, disable and/or terminate your account or disable your articles for any violation of these Guidelines or the User Terms. 

Section 3 

Please do not publish anything you do not have the permission to share. This includes other people’s articles, things that you’ve found on the internet, or content that belongs to another party (but not you). 

Section 4 

As the Peer Platform is an exclusive platform available to ADA members only, please ensure that the content published on Peer remains confidential, unless you receive the express permission of the author to publish it. Any of our original content is expressly prohibited from being shared outside of the Peer Platform without our prior express consent. The confidentiality extends to any communications that you have with us, including if they relate to any decisions made by us pursuant to the Guidelines. 

Section 5 

Peer encourages members’ freedom to post and publish user-generated content on the Platform. 

Section 6 

In the event that you (or the content you propose to publish) do not comply with these Guidelines or the User Terms, and without prejudice to any other rights that we may have, Peer may filter, modify, moderate, publish or permanently remove any communications, member content or such other content on the Platform in order to bring the content into a state where it is compliant. For the avoidance of any doubt, if we form the view that no amount of editing or modification will reasonably bring the infringing content into compliance, we reserve the right to exercise our right to removing that content. 

Section 7 

In the event that any Member’s content is repeatedly falling foul or below the standards of these Guidelines or the User Terms, we reserve the right (but are not obliged to) subject that member’s future content for approval or pre-approval prior to the content being published on Peer. The foregoing is not prejudicial to any other rights we may have (including suspension or termination of any member’s account). 

Section 8 

Peer requires the right to filter, modify, moderate, publish or remove such content in order to ensure: 

1. We comply with our own obligations under the User Terms, these Guidelines and all applicable laws (as amended from time to time); 
2. We curate the member-generated content in our community to ensure quality and alignment with our User Terms and rules of engagement; 
3. we maintain a climate that encourages open but appropriate conversation; and 
4. members are able to participate in an online environment where the Guidelines are established and protected equally. 

If you require further information about the Peer Platform or our Community Management Guidelines please contact our member services department via the Contact Us link on this site