Content Moderation Guidelines

The Texas A&M University System and its members welcome all viewpoints on social media platforms, and comments will not be removed based on the viewpoints expressed, provided the comments otherwise comply with this policy. However, The Texas A&M University System and its member institutions may review and remove comments on posts based on the following criteria:

Comments must be directly related to the topic of the originated post from the page or may be removed.The following are examples of comments that are not directly related to the posts:

Post:	Congratulations to the Texas A&M spring graduating class!
Comment:	College Station, Texas has the best barbeque!
Post:	The campus will be closed tomorrow because of snow and ice on the roads.
Comment:	The baseball team is doing great this year!
Post:	Fall class registration will have new priority deadlines this year.
Comment:	I can’t wait for spring break!

Comments in any of the below categories may be removed:

• Encourage illegal activity.
• Violate the intellectual property rights of any other party, such as copyright or trademark infringement.
• Compromise the safety or security of the A&M System or its members, the public or public systems.
• Contain obscenities.
• Contain sexually or racially harassing content that is severe, pervasive, and objectively offensive.
• Present a grave and imminent threat.
• Incite imminent lawless action.
• Contain fighting words or true threats.
• Be fraudulent.
• Defame.
• Promote a business or commercial transaction.
• Promote a candidate campaigning for election.

The Texas A&M University System and its members may also remove “spam” or comments generated or that appear to have been generated by “social bots” (i.e., content posted by automated software, or “bots”).

Also, please keep in mind that social media companies each have their own policies and standards concerning what may and may not be posted and the actions that it may take regarding unauthorized posts. See each social media platform’s community guidelines for more information. Each social media company may apply its own policies to remove comments, and The Texas A&M University System and its members do not control or direct each social media company’s application of its own community guidelines.

The Texas A&M University System and its members are not responsible for, and neither endorses nor opposes, comments placed on its social media accounts by its visitors. Commenters are personally responsible for their own comments, username, and any information placed on this account by the commenter.

If you are a social media manager within The Texas A&M University System and have questions about content moderation on your System-affiliated social media accounts, please email socialmedia@tamus.edu.