Build Your Community

chapter 4

Setting the rules

Rules have a bad reputation in the online community world. They can seem patronising and authoritarian. Members of many communities are notoriously resistant to rules. Similar to ‘Godwin’s Law’ (‘As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches 1’.)1, the more you try to enforce standards of behaviour in the community the greater your chances of being compared to a dictator.

This is a shame because the purpose of rules isn’t just to restrict what members can and can’t say. The real purpose of rules is to establish and nurture social norms which create a powerful ...