NEW GUIDELINES RE - "LAST SI/OD" SIGS and VIRTUAL BRACELETS!
 

1. "Last OD/SI/ED" date signatures are no longer permitted on RYL under ANY conditions.

This includes a ban on ALL different types of "last" signatures - eg - last SI, cut, purge, binge, suicide attempt, burn, hospitalisation etc etc.

This includes a ban on "last" signatures, regardless of whether they are written in a "Hide box", in white text, or with a trigger warning.

This is due to the fact that alot of members find that these "last SI/OD" sigs are triggering, and also not very recovery orientated ... and members' signatures can be seen all over the RYL forums (even in non-triggering forums).

These sorts of "Last OD/SI" dates ARE permitted in your RYL profile.



2. Having a date in your signature that is worded so that it is more "recovery-orientated", is also no longer permitted.

This includes not allowing dates in signatures such as -

"In recovery from self harm since - 23/05/2008"
"10 days self harm free!"

The moderators have discussed this, and while we do like to encourage members in their recovery from self harm, we just think that determining what is and isnt "recovery-orientated" in terns of these dates in signatures, is just going to be too much of a grey area and open to interpretation.

In addition, these "recovery-orientated" signatures could be just as triggering to members as the "last OD/SI" sigs, especially if the member is still self harming frequently, and with the signature date reflecting this.

And we'd have the whole issue of "how long should a member be self harm free before allowing to post this sort of a recovery-orientated signature" to sort out . And with all the problems that we could foresee with this concept - which ALL could be solved by adopting the "virtual bracelet" idea for signatures - we just decided that a recovery-worded "last" date in signatures was just too complicated to sort out, and that our energies would be better devoted to developing the virtual bracelet idea.

Which brings us to the virtual bracelets ...



3. Members will be permitted to post pictures of "Virtual bracelets" in their signatures, that represent a certain time length in recovery from self harmful behaviours.

Volunteers from RYL have designed different "virtual bracelets" pictures for RYL members to post in their signatures when they reach certain milestones in their recovery from all types of self harm behaviour.

(please see section on Virtual Bracelets for more information)



4. Having a date in your signature, without adding any text, will be permitted.

A date in a member's signature could mean absolutely anything ... and as long as there are no words or any other elaborations around the date, we dont see any reason to ban ALL dates from members' signatures.




These new signature guidelines will come into effect immediately, but we will be extended a grace period to members with regards to any breaches of these new guidelines, until the the community has had time to adjust to these changes.

After a month, this thread will be removed and these new guidelines will be incorporated into our existing RYL Rules.









Introduction

In a recent thread - "last SI/OD discussion" - posted in the Forum and Community Questions forum, RYL members raised some important points regarding the triggering and "anti-recovery" nature of "last SI/OD" dates that were becoming more and more popular in members' signatures.

A great suggestion was made by an RYL member - ((deleted)), - that instead of members posting these "last SI/OD" dates in their signatures (which were quite triggering and not very recovery-orientated), that RYL could offer 'virtual bracelets' for members to post in their signatures, and that these bracelets would represent the amount of recovery time from self injury and other self-destructive behaviours, that a member had achieved.

These virtual bracelets would be similar in nature to the bracelets on sale at the RYL Shop, but instead of a real life object, these virtual bracelets would be in the form of an image that members could post in their RYL signature, which would represent the amount of time in recovery that this member had achieved.

The community agreed that the concept of having "virtual bracelets" in members' signatures was alot more recovery orientated than these "last OD/SI" dates in members' signatures ... so thanks to the long, hard work of one of our RYL mods -[Purple_Rain] - these "virtual bracelet" images were designed and made ready for members to use in their signatures.



Virtual Bracelets - But what are they?

These virtual bracelets are 3D images that have been created from a design program. The final images were formed by setting up a 'camera' (in the program) and print screening it, then doing a little bit of editing, and hey presto you have your bracelets!

Obviously these bracelets look similar to the RYL Shop Bracelets, except they are designed to be used in members' RYL signatures, they're "virtual" (as the name would suggest), and they are 100% FREE!




Choosing and Resizing a virtual bracelet for your RYL signature

1. Selecting the virtual bracelet that you want to use.

* Look at the bracelet images that are available in this photobucket account - from this link, you need to select one of the 4 sub-albums, which are named -

...........ED bracelets circular
...........ED bracelets linear
...........Self harm bracelets circular
...........Self harm bracelets linear









* There are 2 major bracelet designs -

a) circular bracelets - which look like a bracelet laid flat, are clones of the RYL shop bracelets ... but have numbers/words on them to represent the time in recovery. Some of these bracelets have the time frame in recovery written on the beads, and others dont.

example of a circular bracelet ->


b) linear bracelets - are an 'unravelled' bracelet where the bracelet string is stretched out in a straight line (ideal for the top/bottom of a sig) and the number of beads on the bracelet represent how long a member has been in recovery. Beads also are marked with letters to represent the time frame in weeks (W), months (M), and years (Y).

example of a linear bracelet (2 mo, 4 wks) -


* There are 3 bracelet colour categories -

a) self harm - orange

b) eating disorders - blue

c) general recovery - white


2. Once you've selected a bracelet, you may wish to RESIZE it before uploading it to your RYL signature.

Due to our foreseeing that different members will probably be wanting different sized virtual bracelets for their RYL signature, the bracelets provided in the RYL_bracelets photobucket account have been left quite large so that members can resize them for themselves.

If you have your own photobucket account, then it is quite easy to resize your own bracelet to the new size that you want for your signature.

You can resize your virtual bracelet by following these steps -

a) saving the bracelet image to your own photobucket album.

b) clicking on the "edit" function

c) clicking on the "resize" link, and then experimenting with different sizes in order to find the size that you want your RYL virtual bracelet to be (make sure that the "keep proportions" link is ticked when resizing, otherwise your bracelet will look very weird!)

d) Once you've found a size you like, click the "Apply" link, and make sure that you either "save a copy" or "replace original" before exiting the edit screen.

You should then have your very own resized virtual bracelet in your own photobucket album, and ready for uploading to your RYL signature.

If you are still having problems in resizing your virtual bracelet image, please contact one of the following RYL volunteers who may be able to help you, or resize your bracelet for you to use.

List of volunteers

XSudden

screaming_without_words


(If there is anyone who is interested in volunteering your services to help members who are having difficulties in resizing their virtual bracelets, or who can help design and create a custom made virtual bracelet for members who want them, please PM or [purple_rain] and we will add your name to the list.)




Uploading your virtual bracelet image to your RYL signature.


Once you have resized your virtual bracelet in your own photobucket account, it is time to upload it to your RYL signature, which you can do by following this process -

a). Go to your "control panel" in your RYL account

b). Click on the "edit signature" link on the left hand side menu.

c) Looking at the window under the "edit signature" screen, place your cursor in the position where you are wanting your virtual bracelet to appear in your signature, and then click on the image link (which is this little yellow box - - and is the 6th icon from the right)

d) A pop up box should appear, that prompts you to insert the url of your image (which should be the "direct link" url of your image from your own photobucket account if you have resized the image, or the "direct link" url from the RYL_bracelets photobucket account if you are using the bracelet image in its original size.

e) Click "ok" and the image should appear in the window.

f) When you've included everything that you want in your signature and it looks okay, go to the "save signature" link (or go to the "preview signature" link if you want to check how it looks first before saving it) and then your signature should be complete!


If you'd like a custom made virtual bracelet with a different design, colour, arrangements of beads etc, then when we get a list of volunteer RYL members who are willing to help create some more unique virtual bracelet designs for members who want them, you are welcome to contact someone on the list and put in your request for your own unique virtual bracelet.

This is great to hear, thanks typsee and the mods :)

Thank you to all the mods (: Sounds great!

Read & understood. Thank you. (:

xxx

Thank you mods for all your hard work.

Thanks for all the hard work in getting this sorted out, everyone. =]

Thats awesome, thanks Mods =)

Well done for all your hard work and stuff, I'm glad this is now a rule. =]

The only thing I am like Ummm about is, if you aren't allowed to write "8 months free" or whatever... why is it allowed to say the exact same thing on a picture of a bracelet... Or are you allowed to write that... O_o
Seen as you are only allow one picture in your sig anyway... Surely a picture attracts more attention than some written words written in white...

Sorry I'm confused.
Glad it has been sorted anyhow. =]

thank you mods

How soon is this going to be enforced?

I was actually kinda wondering about that myself... hopefully the mods will clarify.

...I think?

Well, I wanted to know if the Mods want us to start post reporting people who have these sigs right away, or give it a few days......

Sorry, I should have clarified my question better!

Oh oh oh.
I don't know then (:
*helpful*

It's ok Chels, I just wasn't sure how they wanted to approach it. Like if they wanted to give it a few days for people to see this for themselves and change them, or if we should start reporting them.

I would imagine it would kick in pretty sharpish, or like a day or so - so that people have chance to read the thread and change their signatures. Kinda like the new rules in the ED forum, we had so long to not get real bad penalties for posting certain stuff and then we would get them.

Like how typsee said -

This is a really good idea.
xx

I like it

Sounds good.

I think the point of the bracelets is that there is no words as to what the recovery is from i.e. purge/OD/SI which is the bit most members found triggering and also the lowest one you can get is 1 week which stops people posting things like "last OD yesterday :(" type thing. Plus the bracelets symbolise recovery whereas saying "last cut 1 month ago" could be taken as recovery or could be taken as non recovery depending on how often you might cut.