POND Documents

The files here are taken as the governing documents ("the Documents") of POND. They are not meant to necessarily be complete or authoritative in all respects. Each Document has two important sections: the rules for changing the document, and the limitations of the document (i.e. when the Document should be treated as guidelines or documentation vs hard rules). These Documents may end up out of date for minor details (as defined in each Document itself), but an effort should periodically be made to keep them in sync.

The Documents are as follows:

  • Role Structure - Defines the organizational structure of POND, particularly the leadership, and contains details pertaining to the criteria, selection process for, and duties of said roles.
  • Policy - Defines organizational policies and procedures. Not every informal procedure or policy will be documented, but the most important ones will, and are considered authoritative except where otherwise specified (i.e. leadership not abiding by them - intentionally or accidentally - should be held accountable).
  • The Code of Conduct - (Under Construction, to be added here within two weeks of adoption of these Documents)

Official Documents Not Included Here

The following documents are considered to be official and binding (except where otherwise specified), but are hosted elsewhere for accessibility or convenience reasons, they may also have laxer update policies as noted below:

  • The Community Rules - including rules for specific channels - are hosted on Discord, and may be changed by a majority vote of the Planners (with a 2-day review period by the Mediators). These Rules apply to all users. The Rules on Discord are considered authoritative and should not be reproduced in these documents. However, enforcement guidelines referencing certain rules are explored here, as discussing the severity of certain misconduct issues when outlining formal mediation and accountability processes without doing so is rather hard. Rules and processes defined in these Documents are meant to be mostly for leaders. In the case where out-of-date Rules are referenced, the spirit and context of the text as written should be used if the policy is needed before the text is updated to reflect the change.
  • Guidelines are encouraged to be provided as accessible, up-to-date documentation of leadership practices on Discord for the benefit of other leaders and/or users. Provided they don't conflict with any hard requirements defined in these documents, they should be considered valid and have no need to be added here. That said, as they're guidelines, they are also not "binding", merely informative.
  • The Summaries are very, very cut-down versions of these Documents with the most salient points for quick reference and targeted at the general userbase. These must always be kept up-to-date with the changes to these Documents. In the case where the Summaries conflict with or are less specific than these Documents, these Documents are considered the authoritative text. Changes to the Summaries should be run past other leaders to prevent mistakes, but otherwise don't need a vote to update.
  • The Transition Plan is not included here because it's ephemeral, but the initial adoption of these Documents also officially ratifies the Transition Plan as presented to users. It must be followed in the course of restructuring leadership, and prioritizing updates to policies and procedures. TODO: This item should be removed after the Transition Plan ceases to be relevant.
  • Other Documents included alongside this Document may define their own exceptions or accessory documents hosted elsewhere.

All Documents must either be a post on the Discord server itself, or easily available from a publicly accessible link on the server, available to all users - there is no penalty for accidentally keeping a Document internal or forgetting to link it, but the link must be posted when the error is pointed out.

Special Thanks

I'd like to thank everyone body who contributed to the original bylaws, while most of the text hasn't survived, I referenced it heavily in making this expanded and easier to navigate version.