Blocking Policy

**Community Resource Page**

This page contains official policy resources written by Harrypotterexpert101. This means that any content that you see in this article is free to be used on another wiki because it is so ingenious. You're welcome!

This page details the grounds for blocking on this wiki. In short, blocking prevents an account/IP Address from contributing to a wiki. A block can always be discussed with Admins on Community Central, the Harrypotterexpert101 Wiki, or on Discord. Wiki Administrators will have the final say in all blocking disputes and have the right to block any user for any time and for any reason. However, these guidelines will cover when blocking is always right for an administrator.

Admins will usually give up to 3-4 temporary blocks before permanently banning a user. Users who don't listen to an Admins warnings are only making it worse for themselves.

To appeal a block, please see this help page to find out how to do that.

## Scenarios where Admins will block accounts

**Vandalism** – Vandalism is defined as any bad-faith edit made with the intent to lower the quality of the wiki or disrupt the functioning of the community. In most cases, an Admin will warn the user in question once before blocking. If they ignore the warning they will be placed under a week-long ban to allow them to reflect on their behavior. If they make a new account during that time to bypass their ban that account will be permanently banned along with the original account. If when their ban has expired and they come back and continue causing problems they will be permanently banned on the spot.

**Spam** – Posting irrelevant spam links in articles, or creating articles which are entirely spam is grounds for an infinite block. This also applies to the Discussions. If a user keeps posting links to external websites that have no relation to the topic of the thread they will be permanently banned on the spot. Excessive posting is a little different, though. The normal rule is if you post more than three new threads within an hour the extra posts will be deleted and the user will be warned about their behavior. If this scenario repeats itself more than three times the account will be temporarily banned. If after they return they continue to not listen to Admin warnings they will be banned for a longer amount of time. If you are blocked more than three times for such an offense the fourth time will be a permanent ban.

**Bad Faith Edits**- Generally Admins will assume good faith, but if an account clearly has no intention to positively contribute to the wiki (blanking many articles within a minute, moving articles to inappropriate names, etc) an immediate and indefinite ban will be given to the account.

**Inappropriate account naming** – Accounts that have rude/inappropriate account names will be blocked immediately and permanently. This also goes for accounts that attempt to impersonate/harass specific users (Ex- Harrypotterexpert101 is Dumb).

**Disruption** – Users who disrupt the wiki (be it by changing other people's comments, making misleading edits, or harassing other users) may also be permanently blocked.

**Copyright violations** – Users who continually post copyrighted material despite being warned will be blocked so as to prevent further violations.

**Blanking pages** – Admins almost always assume good faith, so if you accidentally blank an article don't worry that you will get blocked. However, if it seems that you are doing it on purpose (ex- You blank more than three articles in a minute) you will be permanently blocked.

**Fanon** – users adding fanon will almost always be warned prior to blocking. However, if the user continues to disregard warnings an Admin will block them.

**Personal attacks** – Users attacking other editors personally (in regards to anything) will be given one warning prior to a cool-off ban. The length of the ban is dependent on the severity of personal attacks. Users may be permanently banned if they repeatedly ignore admin/moderator warnings. Admins will generally give up to 3 temporary bans before deciding that a user is not fit enough to contribute to a wiki anymore and permanently block them.

**Sockpuppets**- Whether it is a local or global user trying to bypass their ban, Admins will always permanently block sockpuppet accounts if they have sufficient evidence they are the same person.

## Ban Reasons

Admins will always leave a reason for your block in your BlockLog. They will also almost always provide a link to what they are referencing to in the BlockLog. Here are the most common ban reasons Administrators use:

1. *"Spamming the wiki with external links unrelated to it: link"*

2. *"Vandalism and/or general disruption: link"'*

3. *"Personal Attacks: link (additional info may be added)"*

4. *"Intimidating Behavior: link"*

5. *"Harassment: link"*

6. *"Abusing multiple accounts- Sockpuppet of (User): link/Fandom Support Request Number"*

7. *"Unacceptable Username"*

8. *"Clearly has no intention to contribute positively to the wiki: link"*

Keep in mind that these are not the only ban reasons Admins use, these are just the most common ones.