<P><B>Ban, v. ban, banning, bans
<P>Banning a member of a discussion board results in the permanent prevention of that particular member from submitting his messages to the forums of the boards. Usually a ban is board-wide, and thus excludes the banned member from posting on any forum of the board, even if his offense was confined to a single forum.
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<P><DC=128,128,128>[Scribbled in the margin] And in Forum City, this means to banish someone from the city, sending them into a prison dimension (sort of an empty white void) where they must endure complete boredom until there is such a time when they may once again be permitted back into the city.
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<P><B>Flame, v. flame, flaming, flames
<P>Slang for verbal attacks on another member of the board. If flaming is returned and more people join in, so-called "Flame wars" can break out, in which groups of people are fighting verbally and often with rather abusive language. On some boards, flaming is entirely forbidden. Others allow it. Some boards have a particular forum for members to flame each other, but these are often unsuccessful due to the very spontaneous and emotional nature of flame wars.
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<P><B>Forum, n.
<P>A part of a discussion board in which users can interact by posting messages, which are organized into "threads" with different topics. Depending on the system on which the board is based, images, polls and text of different sizes and colour may also be included in the messages.
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<P><B>Moderator, n.
<P>Often referred to as a mod. An individual who has been appointed by the admin of a discussion board to hold certain authority over one or more of the board's forums. The authority of the moderators depends on the system on which the boards are based, and is in some cases determined by the admin. Most often, the moderators have the power to ban members of the board, and edit, close, move or delete topics from his or her forum.