Updates to our community guidelines

[Moonchild]

Here is the promised "what happens next" post after the a-typical request for the community's opinion on a single member's presence on this forum.

First off, I want to explain why this poll was necessary:
Since about 2016 there has been a constant revolt against Tobin's presence that, despite Tobin doing his best to make changes to his presentation (with great success, i think) refused to die down. I, personally, was regularly accused of using disproportionate double standards when moderating the forum and being wholly unfair; some even blatantly calling me a liar (in so many words). Either way, it was clear none of these accusers were trusting my word, no matter what I said. So the situation became difficult and a dilemma: should I unilaterally ban Tobin from the forum because of the constant nagging of a subsection of our community that wouldn't take anything less as satisfactory despite clear improvements, robbing everyone of Tobin's valuable assistance and replies? Should I continue to waste time on trying to put out dumpster fires because people wouldn't be tolerant enough?...
The improvements mentioned, by the way, were resulting from me simply having a few talks with him... which anyone else could do too but the accusers stubbornly refused to do and insisted on my mediation.
In the end, I discussed the situation again with Tobin, and he in fact came up with the idea to make it a poll; actually expecting it to end up with his ban (which he would 100% honor). I saw the value in it, letting the community decide this once because people would not leave it alone and 2 years was quite enough. After all, it had become a community problem, and the community should decide on a solution.

The massive majority against expelling Tobin from the main community gathering place (the forum) sent a clear message that his input and presence is greatly valued by the community. A secondary, maybe not directly visible goal of this poll was for me to get feedback from the community, to get a pulse of the general populous that makes up our community and how our community members approach these specific kind of issues. Your comments on the poll were very valuable in that respect too (aside from giving Tobin a few things to take away from it).

As a result, I'm updating our community guidelines to adjust it to be a better match to the group of people we are, as a community; to provide clarity for potential new members, and to underline what I'd like our community to continue to be going forward. As a part of that, I've now updated our Code of Conduct, initially written for contributors, to also encompass the rest of the community -- not in the least to stress there is not so much an "us vs. them" within our community, but that we would preferably treat everyone equally. Of course there will always be small differences in treatment between major contributors and new members of a community -- that is basic psychology at work there and also, in fact, is group damage control and protection. Trust has to be built, after all.
The revised Code of Conduct can be read here: https://github.com/MoonchildProductions/UXP/blob/master/docs/CODE_OF_CONDUCT.md

From this day forward, that document will also become an integral part of your participation on this forum, as user or contributor alike. Please read it carefully and try to grasp the overarching intent.
If you have any specific questions about this, the future of our community, specific rules or situations, today is the time to ask them. I will do my best to clarify.