How to Use Twitter to Connect with Victory Baptist Church

Twitter is an internet service on the World Wide Web (WWW) that allows short text messages to be broadcast to the entire world, or just your friends, depending upon what you want.

You can send messages to Twitter through email or cell phone, and your friends can instantly receive them on their computer or phone.

Victory Baptist Church uses Twitter to send urgent and important messages to all the friends and members of Victory Baptist Church. Once you have a Twitter account, you can receive these messages wherever you are, through email or phone.

Step 1 Sign up with Twitter.com

 Connect to the internet and direct your browser to navigate to this website:

twitter.com/

Click on the button labeled "Sign up now".

Comments

[okoshima]

i thought there was a rule against A advertising and B religious instructables. this is both

[canida]

A) This is neither.
B) There is no rule against Instructables with religious content so long as they are in full accord with the Be Nice Policy.
C) Be nice.

[MiltReynolds]

Okoshima, thanks for your comment...I didn't think about that aspect at all.

Please give me a bit of time to research this...I'll definitely remove the instructable if it violates policy.

In the meantime, here's an explanation of my thinking process:

I wanted to send an email to all those in my church, explaining our new Twitter account and how to access it...thinking mainly of the older members who might not have much experience with social media.

But then I thought how easy it would be to assemble a how-to article using instructables.com. From the beginning I didn't feel it would be something the whole world would want, or need, to look at. I thought there was a way to "lock" or restrict access to the instructables, restricting it to just friends.

Anyway, I finished the instructable and then looked for a way to limit access...couldn't find anything, so I published it anyway, thinking that the title was so boring that few, if any, would look at it, unless they were in my church...I was wrong!

I've looked at Instructables' terms and conditions...the only thing that remotely applies is this statement that prohibits spam:

g. Upload, post or otherwise transmit any unsolicited or unauthorized advertising, promotional materials, "junk mail," "spam," "chain letters," "pyramid schemes," or any other form of solicitation;

I couldn't find anything that prohibits religious instructables or even advertising.

So, help me out Okoshima...what does the policy say and where can I see it for myself? I've got a question published in the community forum, so maybe we'll get some feedback from others.

Thanks again for your comment.

Milt

[PKM]

From the TOS in How-to-make-a-great-Instructable:

Please don't use Instructables to:

* Advertise without any useful instruction.
  *Post projects that are inappropriate.

There's a "grayzone" that includes all the things you might think it includes: obscene projects, clearly unsafe projects with no warning or instruction, and projects that are previously copyrighted or rely solely on copyrighted or otherwise protected materials. If your project is in the grayzone, we may decide to un-publish or delete it.

* Post comments that are mean-spirited or insulting.

This isn't advertising, at it only really makes passing mention to the church itself and isn't promotional in tone.

It's not really religious either- "Join our church!" is not the same as "If you are a member of our church, get news via Twitter" the same way that any "Do cool things with X" instructable isn't automatically advertising X.  Note that religious Instructables aren't forbidden, although content with an evangelical tone tends to get seized on, and content with the potential to cause unnecessary offence is against the rules.

Ironically, I clicked on this Instructable expecting to find all the things I just mentioned, and was pleased not to.

[MiltReynolds]

Thanks, PKM! My intent was to instruct, and I didn't think my instructable was attempting to proselytize, but Okoshima's comment sure made me doubt the way I was coming across. Thanks for helping to make the policy clearer.

Milt

[canida]

Hi Milt,

Your Instructable is useful, and totally acceptable. I hope the members of your congregation find it useful.

[MiltReynolds]

Thanks for the encouragement! I was surprised at the comment expressing objection. I really tried to make it simply a how-to, and since it was aimed at a specific audience, I thought anyone not interested would simply pass over it without a click. Anyway, it all ended well!