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3,000,000+ registered accounts  Help Page Back to the Frequently Asked Questions main page Back to the Game Rules main page Messages, Dealing with Other Players Slow or Rude Opponents; Help with Messages, Feedback read: How do I send a message to another player? read: How do I send a message to someone I am playing a game with? read: How do I send a message with a game move? read: How do I read my messages? read: How do I invite another player on ItsYourTurn.com to play a game? read: How do I keep up with my friends on ItsYourTun.com? read: How do I invite someone I have already played to a new game? read: How do I tell a friend about ItsYourTurn.com? read: What is feedback? read: Foul language was used in a player's User ID, name, or rating. What can be done about that? read: Another player is harassing me or offending me in messages. What can I do about this? read: I've received a message from someone claiming to be an ItsYourTurn.com employee. How can I tell if this is really from ItsYourTurn.com? read: How do I use Buddy Lists? read: How do I invite someone on my Buddy List to a game? read: Is there a limit to the number of messages I can have in my inbox? read: Is there a time limit for messages to stay in my inbox? read: How can I save my messages on ItsYourTurn.com? read: How do I view my saved messages on ItsYourTurn.com? read: Is there a time or number limit on the messages I can keep as saved messages? read: How can I read important announcements from the ItsYourTurn.com staff? read: How do I know what users I am ignoring? read: How do I remove someone from my Ignore List? read: My opponent quits the game when he's losing. What do I do? read: How do I find good players? read: How do I find an opponent who will stay in the game until the end? read: Is there a ratings system on ItsYourTurn.com? read: How do I find another player's user profile, statistics, and ratings? read: Someone is deleting my games out of the waiting room. What can I do about this? How do I send a message to another player? Detailed instructions on this can be found in our special short tutorial with cartoons. Briefly, here is what you do. Under 'Talk' in the left-side menu column, click Send message. Type in the name of a user to whom you will send your message and click 'Search for user.' If several users' names match the one you typed, you will see a list of those users. Choose one from the list and click 'Select this user.' Type a subject and a message and click 'Send message.' [ back to top ] How do I send a message to someone I am playing a game with? Go to your Game Status page and click the player's name. It does not need to be your turn in the game. You will then see the game board. Look under the game board and click your opponent's name. You will then see his or her User Profile. Scroll down and look at the options at the bottom. Click 'Send message.' You will then see a screen where you write the message and send it. [ back to top ] How do I send a message with a game move? Open your game and move your pieces. After you have moved all your pieces, but before you click 'Submit this move,' a space appears beneath the game board. Click in that space and type your message in the space. Then, after you click 'Submit this move,' your opponent will see the message at the top of her game board. [ back to top ] How do I read my messages? Look under 'Talk' on the left-side menu column. Click My messages to view your inbox where your new messages are. Click a sender's name to view a message. [ back to top ] How do I invite another player on ItsYourTurn.com to play a game? Detailed instructions on how to invite a user to play can be found in our special short tutorial with cartoons. Briefly, here's what you do: Under 'Play' in the left-side menu column, click 'Invite user to play.' On the next page, choose the game you would like to play, then scroll down. At the bottom of the page, choose the time limit per move in the game. Be sure you give yourself plenty of time to make your moves. ItsYourTurn.com will not restore games that are started with invitations and are lost because someone did not move on time. Then click 'Choose game.' On the next page, type the name of the person you are inviting and click 'Search for user.' If more than one user's name matches what you typed, you will select a user from a list of names and click 'Select this user.' Type an optional message and click 'Send message'. The invited user has the option of accepting or declining your invitation. You will receive a message telling you his answer. If he declines, you may invite someone else. There are lots of people here who want to play games. [ back to top ] How do I keep up with my friends on ItsYourTun.com? You can use your Buddy List to make it easier to send messages to your friends and know whether they are on the site at the same time as you. Look under 'Account' in the left-side menu column and click 'Buddy List.' You will then see your Buddy List page. There is a link on that page that lets you add a new user to the list. If you click that link, you will be prompted to send a message to that user asking if she would like to be on your buddy list. If that user accepts, she is automatically added to your list. For each buddy on your list there is a link to view his profile and a link to send him a message. Inviting a buddy to play a game is also easy - click the link to the profile, then scroll down the profile page and click the link to invite the user to play. If a buddy has been on the site recently, a little symbol appears next to her name on the list. [ back to top ] How do I invite someone I have already played to a new game? If you can pull up a person's user profile page, there's a link near the bottom that says 'Invite this user to a game'. There are several ways to find a person's user profile page: If you're currently playing a game with this person, pull up the game board. Under the game board, click on the person's name, and that will bring up the person's user profile page. You can also pull up a person's user profile page from a message that they've sent you. Just click on the person's name near the top of the message that they sent you. Then click on 'Invite this user to play a game'. If you have finished a game with someone and you want to invite him or her to another game, you can find that user by viewing your completed game and clicking his or her name under the game board. Here is how: Look under 'Play' in the left side menu column and click 'Game status.' You will see your game status page. Scroll down. Under your lists of active games, click 'Look at my user profile.' You will see your profile page. Near the bottom are your game statistics. Click 'Regular' or 'Tournament,' depending on which kind of game you were playing with the person you are looking for. You will then see a list of game types. Click the game type you were playing with that person. You will see a list of people you have played. Find the name of the player you are looking for and click it. You will see the game board. Your opponent's name will be beneath it. Click the name. You will see your opponent's profile page. Near the bottom is the option 'Invite this user to play a game.' Click there. The rest is like the usual invite user to play process. You will choose a game type. Then you will have the option of sending a message to the person with the invitation to a new game. [ back to top ] How do I tell a friend about ItsYourTurn.com? You can use our Tell a Friend feature to send postcards to other people on the Internet telling them about ItsYourTurn.com. The postcard invites your friend to register on our site and play a game with you. Here is how to send the postcard: Look under 'Talk' in the left-side menu column and click 'Tell a Friend.' On the next page, click a postcard design that you like. Fill in your name, your friend's name, and your friend's email address; choose a game to play with your friend; then type an optional message. Click 'Preview' at the bottom of the page. You will see a page showing how your postcard will look to your friend. Scroll down and click 'Submit' at the bottom of the page. You will receive an email asking for verification that your own email address is valid. You must click a link in that email address to send the postcard. [ back to top ] What is feedback? Feedback lets the ItsYourTurn.com community know about your experiences with a particular player. What it is: You can look at a person's feedback on their user profile page. Feedback is what other players on the site think of this player. Currently, two items of feedback are available, Politeness and Timeliness. Politeness is how polite someone is in their communications with you, either through private messages or on the public message boards. 5 is very polite, and 1 is very rude. Timeliness is how fast someone moves: 5 is very fast and 1 is very slow. A low timeliness rating is not necessarily bad-- some players cannot get onto the site more than once a day. Feedback is always visible on the person's user profile page. There is no way to block this information from appearing. Who can provide Feedback: Currently, only paid members can provide feedback. However, both members and non-members can receive feedback. We only let members provide feedback to avoid the possibility of someone creating multiple accounts just to lower someone else's feedback rating. How to give feedback: All feedback is anonymous. No one but yourself will know what feedback you have given. The specific person only sees the total score, never the individual feedback scores. To give someone feedback, pull up their user profile page. On that page you will see their total feedback, and any feedback you have previously given this person. Click on the 'change' link besides your feedback score. This will bring you to the feedback page. Enter your feedback for one or both items. Click 'submit'. This will take you back to the person's user profile page. Check the feedback box to make sure that your feedback was updated. You can change your feedback for this person at any point in the future, if you change your mind. NOTE: Feedback totals are updated every 24 hours, so you won't see the effects of your feedback immediately. How the totals are calculated: Initially everyone's feedback counts as 2 votes. However, if your politeness score rises above 4, then all the feedback you provide will count as 3 votes. If your politeness score falls below 2.2, then your feedback will only count as 1 vote. On ItsYourTurn.com, a polite player's votes is counted three times as much as a rude player's vote. Feedback totals are only calculated once per day, so your feedback will not be counted immediately. How feedback affects you: Your feedback score will be shown in your user profile page. This may affect players who are deciding whether or not to accept your games in the waiting room. However, since matchups for auto-match, tournaments, and ladders are automatic, the feedback scores do not affect these games. When to provide feedback: After you've played someone two or three times and you feel that you are familiar with their playing style, you can provide feedback at that time. However, if a player is immediately rude to you, feel free to give them a 1 politeness rating right away. If you see someone on the message boards that isn't providing any constructive input, you may also give that player a 1 politeness feedback. On the other hand, whenever you encounter someone on the site who is nice and who you would recommend to others, please give them a 5 politeness rating. This will allow others to share in a pleasant playing experience. Remember, you can change your feedback score at any time. [ back to top ] Foul language was used in a player's User ID, name, or rating. What can be done about that? This question deals with foul or offensive language in players’ names and ratings. To learn how to deal with someone whose name is not offensive, but who is sending or posting unwanted messages, please see the next question on how to ignore another player. After you ignore a player, you can also leave them negative feedback (see previous question on 'Feedback'). ItsYourTurn.com is a site for playing games and having friendly conversation with other players. As stated in section 11 of our User Agreement, players on ItsYourTurn.com have agreed not to transmit vulgar or offensive information on our site. Foul language will not be tolerated in User ID’s, names, and ratings. Language of a sexual nature, including language that attempts to solicit cyber sex or sex chatting, also will not be tolerated. If a person is interested in having sexual relations on the Internet, he or she should go to a site that exists for that purpose. If you see a name, User ID, or rating that includes offensive language, please contact us using our online contact form and tell us the name or User ID of that player. We may hide this player’s User ID, name, and ratings until he or she removes the offensive language. If you currently have offensive language in your name or ratings, you should change it now. If your User ID is offensive, write to us and tell us what you would like to change your User ID to. Anyone who has foul or sexual language in his account could have all of his or her communications privileges revoked on ItsYourTurn.com. This means that he or she would not be able to send messages to anyone, post messages on the message boards, or post games to the Waiting Room. [ back to top ] Another player is harassing me or offending me in messages. What can I do about this? You can use our Ignore feature to prevent all of his/her messages from ever appearing on your computer screen. Ignoring a user has the following effects. Private messages sent to you by that user never appear in your message box. If you have games in progress with the user, messages accompanying his moves do not appear to you, although the game board does appear and moving pieces takes place normally. This allows you to finish games against the ignored person without having to read his messages. The ignored user never sees games that you have started and placed in the Waiting Room. You do not see the ignored user's games in the Waiting Room. The user can not invite you to play more games. You will not see the user's postings on the message boards. Best of all, the user is not notified that you are ignoring him. However, in a tournament, you may still be randomly paired with a player whom you are ignoring. You would not see messages from him/her, but you would have the games. Here are ways to activate Ignore: Waiting Room: If you see a nasty name in the waiting room, you can easily ignore this person. Just click the name. (This will not cause you to start a game with this person.) You will see a page showing the game board. Scroll down and look beneath the game board. Click the option to view this player's profile. You will see this player's profile page. Scroll down and look under 'More profile options...' Click 'Ignore this user.' You may also contact us using our online contact form and tell us this player's User ID or name. We might hide this name or User ID in most instances on our site. Private Message: View a user's private message to you or invitation to play a game. Scroll to the bottom of the screen. Among the options there is 'Ignore this user.' Message Board: View a user's posting on a message board. 'Ignore' is among the options beneath the message. Game Opponent: While viewing a game that you are playing against an offensive player, click your opponent's name as it appears beneath the game board. This takes you to his user profile. At the bottom of the user profile is the option to 'Ignore this user.' Search User Profiles: If you know the name or userid of a player you want to ignore, look under 'Spy' in the left side menu column and click 'Search user profiles.' Type in the userid or name to search (userid gives better results). You may see a list of names that match what you typed. Pick one, and you will then see his/her user profile page. At the bottom of the profile page is the option 'Ignore this user.' Offender Currently on Site: Under Spy in the gray menu column, click 'Who's Here.' A list of players who have made moves within the past 5 minutes is displayed. Click on 'profile' for a user, then scroll to the bottom of his profile page. 'Ignore this user' is among the options there. After you ignore a player, you can also leave them negative feedback (see previous question on 'Feedback'). This will alert others to steer clear of this player. ItsYourTurn.com is for people who want to play games and exchange friendly messages. But in any internet community, there are the few who behave improperly. If you encounter any, we hope that our ignore feature will allow you to filter out their comments completely and continue gaming in peace. [ back to top ] I've received a message from someone claiming to be an ItsYourTurn.com employee. How can I tell if this is really from ItsYourTurn.com? All ItsYourTurn.com messages should come from either Webmaster or Tournament Director. However, since it's possible (although unlikely) that someone can put this in their NAME field and appear to be the webmaster, there's a way to be very sure. At the top of the message, Webmaster will be a clickable link. Click on that link, and make sure that the DATE JOINED on the profile page is 03/20/98 (March 20, 1998). It is impossible for players to forge the join date, so if the account was created in March 1998, you can be certain that the message is geniune. If the join date is anything else (especially if it's a recent date), then the message is a forgery, and you should forward it to us immediate by clicking on the CONTACT US link located at the bottom of every page. [ back to top ] How do I use Buddy Lists? Your Buddy List tells you if your friends are logged on ItsYourTurn.com, and it helps you to send them messages. To view your Buddy List, look under 'Account' in the left-side menu column and click 'Buddy List.' The list will appear, and next to each name will be a small symbol that tells if that person has been on our site recently. To add people to your Buddy List, you must send a request to them. The link to send this request is at the bottom of your Buddy List. Sending the request is like sending a regular message. When the recipient receives the message, if she clicks 'I accept,' she will be added to your buddy list. [ back to top ] How do I invite someone on my Buddy List to a game? There's a shortcut way to invite someone on your Buddy List to play a game (and also to do most other operations). Pull up your buddy list. You'll notice that next to each person's name there's a link to their 'profile'. Click on that link. At the bottom of each person's profile page, there's an option to invite that person to a game. If you click on that link, you will be sent to the game invitation page with the person's name already filled in. This will save you the hassle of searching for that person on the site. [ back to top ] Is there a limit to the number of messages I can have in my inbox? There is no limit to the number of messages you can have in your inbox. However, messages disappear when they are 30 days old. If you want to save a message forever, you can click 'Save' among the options beneath a message. It will then move to your list of saved messages and disappear from your inbox. [ back to top ] Is there a time limit for messages to stay in my inbox? Messages only stay in your inbox for 30 days. If you want to save a message for a longer period of time, view the message and click Save among the options displayed beneath the message. The message will disappear from your inbox and move to your list of saved messages. Messages will stay in the Saved messages box unless a year passes without you coming to our site. If you stay away for a year, the messages will be erased. [ back to top ] How can I save my messages on ItsYourTurn.com? You can save any private messages that you have already read on ItsYourTurn.com. You can not save a message if you have not read it yet. Here is how to save them: While viewing a message, look at the options just beneath it. Click 'Save.' This will cause the message to be removed from your Inbox and added to your saved messages box. You can also save many messages at once. View the list of messages in your Inbox. Click in the little box next to the Date Sent on each message that you want to save. Then scroll down and click 'SAVE all checked messages.' The messages that were checked will all be moved to your saved messages box. [ back to top ] How do I view my saved messages on ItsYourTurn.com? Look under 'Talk' in the left-side menu column and click 'My messages.' This will take you to your Inbox for new messages. While viewing your Inbox, look above the list of messages and click 'saved messages.' Then you will see your list of saved messages. [ back to top ] Is there a time or number limit on the messages I can keep as saved messages? There is a limit to the number of messages that you can keep as saved messages. You can keep either 500 messages, or a number of messages equal to 3 times the number of days since you created your User ID on ItsYourTurn.com, whichever is higher. The only limit on how long your messages can saved is this: If you do not log on to ItsYourTurn.com for a year, your saved messages are erased. [ back to top ] How can I read important announcements from the ItsYourTurn.com staff? Look under 'Talk' in the left-side menu column and click News. You will then see the message board specifically for announcements from ItsYourTurn.com. [ back to top ] How do I know what users I am ignoring? Look under 'Account' in the left-side menu column and click Edit ignore list. You will see a list of users that you are ignoring. You may remove someone from your ignore list using the link next to his or her name. [ back to top ] How do I remove someone from my Ignore List? Look under 'Account' in the left-side menu column and click Edit ignore list. You will see a list of users that you are ignoring. You may remove someone from your ignore list using the link next to his or her name. [ back to top ] My opponent quits the game when he's losing. What do I do? There is nothing that can be done to prevent this. If the game has 4 or fewer moves in it, your opponent can delete the game and completely erase it. But if more than 4 moves have been made, the game can not be deleted. If your opponent does not make a move after 4 moves, he will eventually forfeit the game, and it will be recorded as a win for you. Non-tournament games time out after a certain amount of time. The time limit per move is chosen before the game is started, and the options for time limits are, in numbers of days, 3, 7, 14, 21, 30, and 45. Main Tournament games time out if a move is not made in 48 hours, and Fast Tournaments time out if a move is not made in 28 hours. Extra hours are given to allow for weekends in Tournaments. If your opponent does not move for a certain number of days, the game will disappear from your game status page. This prevents your game status from becoming cluttered with idle games. This number of days is 14 by default, but you can change the number if you look under 'Account' in the left-side menu column and click 'Edit user profile.' On your profile page, scroll down to the option 'Hide Idle Games' and set the number of days. Then click 'Submit Form.' [ back to top ] How do I find good players? Here are some ways that you might find good players. Look in tournaments in progress that are in advanced rounds and see who is in them. Here is how to do this and invite these good tournament players to games: Look under 'Spy' in the left-side menu column and click 'Tournament area.' On the tournament page, click either 'Tournaments in Progress' or 'Past Tournaments.' You will see a list of tournaments. Click some of the older tournaments from about six months ago. You will see a list of game types and rounds. Look for the game type that you want to play and click round 2 or 3 or later. You will see the names of the players in the sections. Click a player's name, and you will see a list of opponents which that player played against in that tournament. Click one of the opponents, and you will see the game board. Underneath the game board, you will see the names of the two players in the game. Click the one you want to play a game against, and you will see his or her profile page. At the bottom of the profile page, you will see the option 'Invite this user to play a game.' Click that, and you will see a list of game types. Choose a game type, scroll down, and click 'Choose game.' You will then see a screen where you can type a brief message. You can introduce yourself here. Then click 'Send message.' The invitation will be sent. [ back to top ] How do I find an opponent who will stay in the game until the end? In an Internet community like ItsYourTurn.com, it is hard to know if some random person you meet on our site will be serious enough to play games through to the end. Here are some ways to find opponents who will probably be more serious: Invite your friends who play games, your old college buddies, people like that to join ItsYourTurn.com and play games with you. It is a great way to stay in touch and pass messages back and forth. You can use our Tell a Friend feature to do this. Look at who is playing in round 2 or later of tournaments. These people are probably serious players who stay with their games and do not let them time out. Here is how you can find them and invite them to games: Look under 'Spy' in the left-side menu column and click 'Tournament area.' On the tournament page, click either 'Tournaments in Progress' or 'Past Tournaments.' You will see a list of tournaments. Click some of the older tournaments from about six months ago. You will see a list of game types and rounds. Look for the game type that you want to play and click round 2 or 3 or later. You will see the names of the players in the sections. Click a player's name, and you will see a list of opponents which that player played against in that tournament. Click one of the opponents, and you will see the game board. Underneath the game board, you will see the names of the two players in the game. Click the one you want to play a game against, and you will see his or her profile page. At the bottom of the profile page, you will see the option 'Invite this user to play a game.' Click that, and you will see a list of game types. Choose a game type, scroll down, and click 'Choose game.' You will then see a screen where you can type a brief message. You can introduce yourself here. Then click 'Send message.' The invitation will be sent. Join some tournaments. This will randomly group you with other players on the site. They will not all be serious players, but some will. If you strike up a conversation with them in the game and you like them, you can invite them to more games outside of the tournament. To learn how to join a tournament, see the tournament help section. [ back to top ] Is there a ratings system on ItsYourTurn.com? There is no formal system that rates players' ability according to their wins and losses on ItsYourTurn.com. The reason for this is that it is too easy to cheat. A person can create multiple userids on our site and play against himself and build up the statistics for one of his userids. Players can rate themselves informally. These self-ratings appear next to games that are waiting for an opponent in the waiting room. You can also view these self-ratings on a player's user profile page. A player's record of wins and losses also appears on her user profile if she has elected to show them. If you are looking for the good players to play games, then see this question for suggestions. [ back to top ] How do I find another player's user profile, statistics, and ratings? You can find this information about another player in several different ways. Search: You may search for his or her profile using the link in the left-side menu column: Look under 'Spy' in the left-side menu column and click Search user profiles. You will see a page where you type a name or userid to search for. The userid will give better results. You might see a list of names resulting from your search. Pick one and click 'Select this user.' You will see that user's profile. If he or she has chosen to allow his game stats and completed games to be seen by other players, you will see them on that page. If he or she has entered ratings, you will see those too. Gameboard: If you are viewing a gameboard, you will see your opponent's name underneath it--or, if it is not a game that you are playing, you will see the names of both players. You can click these names to view their user profiles. (To learn how to view other people's games, see this question.) Message: Also, while viewing any private message or message board posting, you can click the name of the person who wrote the message and you will see his or her profile. [ back to top ] Someone is deleting my games out of the waiting room. What can I do about this? You can use our Ignore feature to prevent this person from joining any of your games in the future. They will not know you're ignoring them, and they will not ever see any of your games in the waiting room. We apologize for the inconvenience, and we hope that you'll continue to post games in the Waiting room for REAL players to join. Also, please keep the delete messages that were sent to you, and contact us using our online contact form so that we can take action against this person. There are more details on this page about the ignore feature: what it does, and how to ignore someone. [ back to top ] Back to the Frequently Asked Questions main page Back to the Game Rules main page Help! - Player Login Game status - Start new game - Waiting Room - Auto-Match My messages - Send message - Tell a friend! Ladder area - Tournament area - Who is here? - Search user profiles Edit user profile - Change password - Edit ratings - Logout New Game Releases Create new userid Game Rules - Features and tips - Testimonials Questions or comments? Please Contact Us User agreement | Privacy policy ©1998-2021 It's Your Turn, Inc. All rights reserved.