Terms of Use for Critter Cams’ Moderated Discussion

Thanks for participating the Wildlife Center’s Critter Cam moderated discussion! The goal of this chatroom is to interact with Wildlife Center supporters in a fun and educational setting. We also use the discussion for online instruction with students from around the world.

Please be aware that this is a moderated discussion – comments are not automatically posted. To ensure a vibrant, educational, and topical discussion about wildlife, several Wildlife Center staff and volunteers periodically sign in to read and approve comments.

Instructions on using the JotCast moderated discussion:

  • On each Critter Cam page, you’ll find the moderated discussion on the right-hand side of the page. Enter your name in the box provided at the bottom of the discussion box. Type your comment in the large comment field, then click “send” or hit enter to submit the comment into the moderator’s queue for review. Note that if you wish to create a line break in your comment/question, hit “shift + enter” to start a new line.
  • The moderated discussion opens in a new full-screen tab on mobile devices for the best user experience. 
  • To the right of the field for your name, you’ll see four icons. In order, from left to right:
    • My JotCast. This is where you may turn on sound notifications for the discussion – when new messages are published, you’ll hear the audio clip you select (chime, classic, knock, etc). You may also see your message history here; this is a compilation of all of the messages from you that have been published. There’s no need to register for an account.

  • Upload image. Click on the upload icon (looks like a small arrow pointing up). You may click on the black “choose a file” text to select a file from your computer, or you can drag a file to the blue cloud and arrow. Click “upload image” and your photo and comment will be submitted to the moderator queue for review.

  • Minimize. The third button will minimize the comment field if you’d like to see more of the published discussion.
  • Popout. This icon (four arrows going outward) will “pop out” the discussion into a new tab.
  • To post YouTube videos on the discussion, simply paste the URL of the video. It must be a YouTube video link to be fully displayed in the chat window.
     

Terms of Use

Help us keep our discussion fun, friendly, educational, and appropriate. We ask everyone watching Critter Cams and using the moderated discussion to abide by these terms of use.

  • Please be respectful of moderators, Center staff, and one another. Absolutely no profanity; the Center uses this platform to host educational sessions with students around the world. There will be no discussion of politics, religion, drugs, or alcohol.
  • Remember, this is a moderated discussion. Our staff or volunteer moderators will review all submitted posts, including photos, links, and videos; moderators may opt not to share your post if they feel it doesn’t contribute to the overall educational nature of the discussion. Moderators have the ability to edit your comment/question and may remove a portion of it if they deem it inappropriate.
  • Not all comments will be published. When the discussion is extremely busy, the moderators may choose not to post all greetings and comments, or they may choose not to post comments sent an earlier time which no longer contributes to the current discussion.
  • Feel free to have fun, but remember, this is an educational discussion focused on wildlife. We have no issues sharing other general wildlife news and even short updates from other wildlife webcams, but remember this website is for the Wildlife Center of Virginia, and we will not use the discussion as a chat forum for other cameras.
  • If sharing photos, please appropriately credit in your comments or in the photo caption.
  • Moderators can ban users who repeatedly fail to abide by these terms of use.
     

Critter Cam Screenshots and Video Feed

Viewers are welcome to take and share screenshots and video feed with appropriate credit.

  • Unedited screenshots and video footage should simply be credited to the Wildlife Center of Virginia.
  • Viewers who edit screenshots or video footage from Critter Cams must include proper credit to the Wildlife Center, along with credit to the editor, to establish that the Center did not edit the particular footage. Examples:
    • Video is property of the Wildlife Center of Virginia, captured and edited by [your name]
    • Screenshot is property of the Wildlife Center of Virginia, edited by [your name]