Code of Conduct

Open Repositories (OR) is dedicated to providing a welcoming and positive experience for everyone, whether they are in a formal session or a social setting, are taking part in activities online, or are conference staff or hosts. OR participants come from all over the world and bring with them a wide variety of professional, personal and social backgrounds; whatever these may be, we treat colleagues with dignity and respect. We all represent the OR community.

OR participants communicate primarily in English, though for many of us this is not our native language. We therefore strive to express ourselves simply and clearly remembering that unnecessary use of jargon and slang will be a barrier to understanding for many of our colleagues. We are sensitive to the fact that the international nature of OR means that we span many different social norms around language and behaviour and we strive to conduct ourselves in ways that are unlikely to cause offence.

OR gatherings are information-rich and intended to generate much discussion and debate. We discuss ideas from a standpoint of mutual respect and reasoned argument.

OR participants work together to promote a respectful and safe community. In the event that someone’s conduct is causing offense or distress, OR has an Anti-Harassment Policy, detailed below, which can be applied to address the problem. The first step in dealing with any misconduct is to contact a member of the local conference committee, the OR steering committee, or the program chairs immediately; at an OR event, these people can be identified by distinctive name badges and are listed on the conference website.