Appropedia:Code of conduct

Appropedia supports open and collaborative knowledge-sharing. This code of conduct seeks to create digital spaces that are constructive for people from different backgrounds and perspectives. We hope to support productive disagreement and collaboration, without suppressing critique or productive debate.

By participating in a digital space managed or facilitated by Appropedia Foundation, you agree to follow this Code of Conduct. This includes our wiki pages, discussion spaces, webinars, messaging groups, shared documents and boards, social-media interactions, and related follow-up communications. This Code also applies to Appropedia staff, facilitators, volunteers, partners, and others acting on Appropedia’s behalf.

Specific events or projects may publish additional participation terms, including provisions on recording, platform use, language access, or reporting arrangements. Those terms apply alongside this Code.

Participants are expected to:

• Respect the community's purpose and the activities in which they take part.
• Treat others with respect, allow different views, and respectful disagreement.
• Communicate in good faith and seek clarification before making assumptions about another person’s intent.
• Offer and receive constructive criticism without personal attacks.
• Respect differing levels of expertise, access needs, cultural contexts, and language ability.
• Follow reasonable instructions from facilitators and moderators.
• Protect confidential, personal, or sensitive information shared by others.
• Give appropriate credit when using another person’s work, ideas, images, or contributions.
• Help maintain a space that is focused, useful, and welcoming.

The following behavior is not acceptable:

• Harassment, intimidation, threats, hate speech, discrimination, personal attacks, or degrading, stereotyped, or exclusionary treatment of any person or group.
• Unwanted sexual attention, sexualised language or material, or inappropriate personal contact.
• Sharing another person’s private information, messages, images, recordings, or location without permission.
• Recording, screenshotting, or distributing content from an event or digital space contrary to the stated terms or without appropriate consent.
• Deliberately disrupting an event, discussion, shared workspace, or platform, or showing disregard for rules and instructions by facilitators.
• Encouraging violence, self-harm, harassment, or other conduct that creates a credible safety risk.
• Impersonation, misrepresentation of identity or affiliation, or attempts to evade moderation or enforcement actions.
• Using shared spaces primarily to advertise, sell products or services, recruit customers, or promote unrelated commercial activity without permission.
• Not properly crediting the sources of content you contribute, including open licensed work.

Disagreement, criticism, or firm discussion of ideas is not, by itself, a Code of Conduct violation. Moderators should distinguish between good-faith disagreement and conduct that targets, excludes, intimidates, or harms others.

If you experience or witness conduct that may violate this Code, report it through the reporting channel identified for that Appropedia space or event. You may also notify a facilitator, moderator, or designated Appropedia contact.

Reports should include relevant details where possible, such as what happened, where and when it occurred, who was involved, and any available records or screenshots. A person making a report is not expected to confront the other person directly.

Where a report concerns a facilitator or moderator, the event or project should provide an alternative reporting contact.

Reports will be handled as privately as possible. Information may need to be shared with a limited group of responsible people in order to assess the situation, protect participants, or meet legal or safeguarding obligations.

The responsible Appropedia staff may review available evidence, seek clarification from relevant parties, and consider the context, severity, pattern of behaviour, and impact on those involved.

Where practical and appropriate, the reporting person will be informed that the concern has been received and, later, that action has been taken. Appropedia may not be able to share all details of an outcome.

Responses will be proportionate to the situation and may include:

• A reminder of the Code of Conduct or request to change behaviour.
• A private warning.
• Editing or removal of content.
• Restrictions on participation in a specific discussion, event, platform, or communication channel.
• Removal from a live event or digital space.
• Temporary suspension from Appropedia activities.
• Long-term or permanent exclusion from specified Appropedia spaces or events.
• Referral to the relevant platform, institution, or authorities where there is a serious safety, legal, or safeguarding concern.

Appropedia may act immediately, including removal from an event or platform, where this is necessary to protect participants or maintain the integrity of the space.

Appropedia will designate the people responsible for applying this Code in each relevant space or event. For co-hosted activities, the event-specific terms should state the reporting route, escalation process, and final decision-making authority. These arrangements may vary according to the organisations involved and the nature of the event.

This Code was created based on these resources:

• Open Environmental Data Project, Code of Conduct for Virtual Events. https://www.openenvironmentaldata.org/convening/code-of-conduct
• Contributor Covenant, Code of Conduct for Digital Communities, Version 3.0. https://www.contributor-covenant.org/adopt/

Last updated: July 2026.