As most of you know, keeping the PatternReview message boards a fun and friendly place is not an easy task.

I established the Posting Guidelines a few years ago to help all posters and readers know how to best use the boards and the site. I developed these guidelines based on suggestions and comments I received from the board moderators, who have worked hard for years on the boards to make them the safe and friendly place that they are today.

Included within the posting guidelines is a clause that prohibits advertising on the boards. There are very good reasons for this policy. Imagine a situation in which all sorts of unsolicited advertising was allowed on the boards, including beauty products, embroidery software and what not. Wouldn't that be a nightmare to wade through? Would you find yourself questioning the opinions and advice you received if you thought the poster were trying to sell you something? Finally, would our wonderful Merchants of PR (who support PatternReview financially, supply our contest prizes and offer discounts to PatternReview members) continue to support PatternReview if advertising on the boards were condoned?

We are aware that the posting guidelines may not be acceptable by some members. When the guidelines are breached, we open a dialogue with the member in question. In most cases we have been able to come to a reasonable agreement; in some very rare cases, unfortunately, we've had to ban him or her.

This decision to ban members is never made in haste, and is discussed in the moderators forum for weeks (sometimes months!). In the interest of the site, our members and our advertisers, no member is banned from PR without a unanimous decision to do so.

If a member is banned from the website, neither the moderators nor I delete that member's prior posts (unless they contain objectionable content). To do so destroys the continuity of PatternReview's information threads, which are vital to this community.

Thank you all for your understanding.