What are those ominous looking, small, red boxes on members posts to thread from Seed Swaps. They appear in the bottom right corner with a exclamation mark by them?

It's for reporting inappropriate posts, spam, etc.

Click on it to see what it does. One click isn't enough to trigger it. If you click, it'll explain what it is, and give you a chance to confirm the action or back out.

It is the report box. If you see a post that isn't in line with polite posting or a post that is getting too political or religious in nature, you can hit the report button. Then Dave and family will take a look.

Oh, sorry if was too religious in nature or posted spam. I am relatively new on the site. I am not political, so I know I didn't post anything in that respect.

Samlav,
Please understand, the icon appears on everyone's posts - not just yours. You have not done anything inappropriate.

The icon is there so that we may 'police' ourselves to report anything that we find wrong. When the icon is used the owners of the site check to see if posts need to be removed.

You are doing just fine!

Oh that's good to hear. Thanks for the relief.

Samlav,
to Greene`s response. You`re doing great and your input is appreciated

I call the red box the tattle-tale-button. It's not in my personal universe.

If nothing else, it is highly convenient when people use it to report spam, which happens at least once every couple days.

Also, it's nice for the community to police itself, rather than having a bunch of moderators running around making decisions about what's acceptable, editing peoples' posts, issuing personal warnings, etc etc etc. Blah.

I hadn't thought about it for spam. And I do agree that moderators would go wack trying to keep everyone happy with tone etc. I've just rarely seen any need to 'call in the calvary' on anything, seems folks rather call each other out when things get heated up or start to go sideways. I rather enjoy passionate, yet courteous, discussions. Makes me think a bit more objectively. I wish the rest of the internet was half as polite as this site...