The Apple Wiki:Ground rules

Introduction
Since the inception of this wiki, it has been coming along quite well. But this wiki was not made to be, 'quite well'. It was made to be more than 'quite well'. The problem is that no explicit ground rules have been put in place. So without further ado, here are some rough rules to abide by...

PS: You are free to add anything within reason. However, if you would like to remove somebody else's rule, post a topic in the 'discussion' page of this article and see if others feel the same way. If there is a general vibe that the posted rule does not belong, then you may remove it.

A note on tutorials
If you have an original tutorial that you believe is useful to the community, by all means, post it :)

The tutorial rule below is just to prevent people from posting a single page with a link to a video tutorial on youtube

Things to think of before making a page

 * Is this really needed?
 * Is this explicitly stated anywhere else in the wiki? If so, should it be restated?
 * Do I know enough on the subject and have beyond a reasonable doubt that the information I am about to post is true and accurate?
 * Does this really belong here? Or does it belong in a place like iClarified (A website for iPhone tutorials for beginners)?

Basic Ground Rules
These are some basic rules to abide by when adding a page or making an edit

No posting of copyrighted material
Anything that could legally get us in trouble should not be posted, ever. This means you should never directly link to:
 * Secpacks
 * Decrypted ramdisks or root filesystem DMGs
 * Applications copyrighted by Apple (AppStore.app, lockdownd, MobileInstallation.framework, etc.)
 * Patched Applications/Frameworks copyrighted by Apple, even though the above is the same thing, some people don't realize it
 * Basebands
 * Bootloaders
 * IPSW files that are not hosted by Apple
 * IPSW files that were sold for a price by Apple
 * IPA files that are not hosted by Apple

That being said, the following things that can be linked to without recourse:
 * IPSW files hosted on Apple's website
 * IPA files hosted on Apple's website (Don't abuse this, only for special circumstances)
 * .plist files from your iPhone (they can't be copyrighted exactly, while code can :P)

No n00b Tutorials
This is not the right place for them. Maybe someone can make a page specifically for beginners. That would work. Or maybe just link to the tutorial on the appropriate page. For example, someone had created a page exactly for "Jailbreaking and Activating the iPhone 3G with WinPwn". Then, the page only contained a link to a YouTube video. It would be better for something like this to be put at the bottom of the WinPwn page, no? If there is no place for it, feel free to just add in a "Links" section. Nobody is going to bust your nut for that.

This is not a customer service desk
If you messed up your iPhone, please do not post on a random wiki page asking for help. Instead, chances are you used a tool from the devteam, so ask at hackint0sh. Or, ask on IRC, in #iphone on irc.osx86.hu. But please know, this is not the right place to ask for help.

That being said, you may want to browse the various articles, as they may answer your question.

No Copy&Pasted Articles
If you create a new article and it is nothing but content that was Copy&Pasted from another website, do not even bother. On the other hand, if you make an honest effort to reword it and you honestly do think that it belongs on this wiki and a link would not be as good, then it is OK. A great example of this is the BootNeuter page. It started off being copy&pasted, but it was at least formatted correctly and tweaked minorly. Then other members changed it around and now it is almost completely reworded.

No drama
Save it for someone else. Everyone is welcome here. If Zibri wants to come in here and post an article, as long as it abides by the rules, then nobody will stop him. Same goes for if someone like aCujo wants to contribute. As long as the rules are followed, all is well. An extension to this rule is that nobody is allowed to directly insult anybody else. The Zibri and ZiPhone pages, well, what they used to be, is normally not that bad, but I guess they were removed because of all of the controversy.

No advertising your website/forum/wiki/etc.
Don't create a page just to advertise your new website please. Same goes for editing a link to a tutorial that was on your website into a page. It is probably already on that page, or at a place like iClarified. However, this rule is geared towards a generic iPhone website or blog that a random person made. If there is a perfectly original tutorial or something like that, that has not been posted anywhere else before, and is useful to people, then by all means, you can link to it.

Do not make numerous, consecutive edits
Making a lot of edits causes the Recent changes to be filled up. In addition to annoying those that subscribe to the Recent changes feed (via Atom or Twitter), this hinders everyone's ability to discover new information and track down any malicious changes. Therefore, for every hour (resetting at :00), you may only make 20 major edits and 20 minor edits. In addition, you may make no more than 50 edits per day (resetting at midnight MDT). Any unused number of edits will not "roll over" to the next hour or day. Avoid "clumping" your edits. (e.g.- Do not make 15 edits at 01:58, and then another 15 at 02:01.) Temporary exemptions can be made at the discretion of administrators and/or the community.

Regarding the creation of pages for programs
We all have to start somewhere, but try to keep the community's needs in mind before making a page here. Do not announce "coming soon" software; we don't want vaporware on this wiki. If you are involved with the program's creation, you should not create the page yourself. (Credible hackers are exempt from this.) Feel free to include a screenshot, but don't take a screenshot of every single screen to illustrate how the program works. Do not create multiple redirects to your page with various misspellings of the program name. Add the page to the appropriate category. If it has a GUI, put it in the "GUI Tools" category. Otherwise, add it to the category "Software." Do NOT add the category "Hacking Software." If the tool is not free, ask on the discussion page first if the community wants to have it included. Otherwise it will be considered spam and you face the risk of getting banned. If there is already a program on the wiki that performs the tasks your program does, there should something to distinguish yours. Otherwise, there's no need for it to be here.

When in doubt, feel free to drop a note about the program in the Community portal and the community will decide if it belongs on the wiki or not.

User Pages Warning
Although it's not that terrible of a sin, please keep in mind that user pages are not your MySpace, a few details about to that you choose to put up is fine, but don't overdo it :)