The Community is dedicated to our values of treating every individual with respect and dignity. In the interest of fostering an open and welcoming environment, all participants, including attendees, speakers, sponsors, volunteers, online contributors, and IBM employees are expected to show courtesy for each other and our community by creating a harassment-free experience for everyone, regardless of age, personal appearance, disability, ethnicity, gender identity and expression, body size, level of experience, nationality, race, religion, caste, or sexual identity and orientation. Expected behavior applies to both online and offline engagement within the community.
Examples of behavior that contributes to creating a positive environment include:
- Using welcoming and inclusive language
- Being respectful of differing viewpoints, experiences, and cultures
- Gracefully accepting constructive criticism
- Focusing on what is best for the community
- Showing empathy towards other community members
- Being mindful of your surroundings and your fellow participants and listening to others
- Valuing the contributions of all participants
- Engaging in collaboration before conflict
- Pointing out unintentionally racist, sexist, casteist, or biased comments and jokes made by community members when they happen
Examples of unacceptable behavior by participants, even when presented as "ironic" or "joking," include:
- The use of sexualized language or imagery and unwelcome physical contact, sexual attention, or advances
- Trolling, insulting/derogatory comments, and personal or political attacks
- Public or private harassment, including offensive or degrading language
- Publishing others' private information, such as a physical or electronic address, without explicit permission. This includes any sort of "outing" of any aspect of someone's identity without their consent.
- "Doxxing," Publishing screenshots or quotes, especially from identity slack channels, private chat, or public events, without all quoted users' explicit consent.
- Engaging in spamming activities, such as repeatedly sending unsolicited messages, LLMs (Large Language Models) output, advertisements, or promotional content to community members without previous IBM authorization.
- Other conduct which could reasonably be considered inappropriate in a professional setting
The entire community is responsible for upholding the terms of the Code of Conduct in events and spaces and reporting violations if they see them. The internal team at IBM is ultimately responsible for clarifying the standards of acceptable behavior and enforcement, and is expected to take appropriate and fair corrective action in response to any instances of unacceptable behavior.
If a participant or contributor engages in negative or harmful behavior, IBM will take any action they deem appropriate, including but not limited to issuing warnings, expulsion from an event with no refund, deleting comments, permanent banning from future events or online community, or calling local law enforcement. IBM has the right and responsibility to remove, edit, or reject comments, commits, code, wiki edits, issues, and other contributions that are not aligned to this Code of Conduct, or to temporarily or permanently ban any contributor or participant for other behaviors that they deem inappropriate, threatening, offensive, or harmful.
This Code of Conduct applies both within project spaces and in public spaces when an individual is representing the project or its community. Examples of representing a project or community include using an official project e-mail address, posting via an official social media account, or acting as an appointed representative at an online or offline event. Representation of a project may be further defined and clarified by project maintainers.
Instances of abusive, harassing, or otherwise unacceptable behavior may be reported by contacting the project team at [email protected]. All complaints will be reviewed and investigated and will result in a response that is deemed necessary and appropriate to the circumstances. The project team is obligated to maintain confidentiality with regard to the reporter of an incident. Further details of specific enforcement policies may be posted separately.
Project maintainers who do not follow or enforce the Code of Conduct in good faith may face temporary or permanent repercussions as determined by other members of the project's leadership.
This Code of Conduct does not supersede existing IBM corporate policies, such as the IBM Business Conduct Guidelines and IBM Business Partner Code of Conduct. IBM employees must follow IBM's Business Conduct Guidelines. IBM's business partners must follow the IBM Business Partner Code of Conduct. IBM employees concerned with a fellow IBMer's behavior should follow IBM's own internal HR reporting protocols, which include engaging the offending IBMer's manager and involving IBM Concerns and Appeals. IBM employees concerned with an IBM business partner's behavior should notify [email protected].