Moderation Policy for a Community Video App: Setup Guide

A community guidelines document for a social app has seven parts: scope, prohibited content, restricted content, live-session rules, an enforcement ladder, reporting and appeals, and transparency. Write each rule in plain words, attach an action to it, and name who decides. Apple and Google both expect working reporting, blocking and moderation, so the document must match tools that exist.

This guide gives the structure, example clause wording that is our own sample text for you to adapt, and what the two app stores require. It is written for the owner of a conversation-heavy, adult-leaning video community, for instance one built from a white-label Clapper clone, where the temptation is to promise "light moderation" and stop there. It is guidance, not legal advice; have counsel review your final text for your market.

Why a light-moderation brand still needs rules

Many community apps are founded on a promise: members may speak freely and the company will not police opinion. That stance is a fair design choice. It is also incomplete, because four outside parties set a floor that does not depend on your taste.

• App stores. Apple and Google review apps with user content for specific controls, covered in the next section.
• Payment partners and card networks. A payment partner can end service if illegal or abusive content passes through your coins and payouts.
• Advertisers and sponsors. Brands want to know where their name appears.
• Law. Child safety, copyright takedown and platform-safety statutes apply to hosts of user content in many places.

So the useful framing is not "moderated or not". It is "permissive on opinion, strict on a short list of harms, and clear about both". The sections below show how to write that. For the working side, the process of screening, queues and reviewers, read content moderation for a short video app and content moderation models. This post is the written policy that those workflows enforce.

What Apple and Google Play require

Both stores publish their rules, and both change them, so read the current text at the source. As of October 2026 the pages say the following.

Read the full texts: Apple's App Review Guidelines and Google Play's User Generated Content policy. Our companion post on app store review for user-generated content shows how reviewers test these controls. The practical rule: every control in the table needs a matching sentence in your guidelines and a matching button in your app.

The template, section by section

Use these seven sections in this order. Each has a job, a suggested length and sample clause wording. The wording is our own, written for this guide; adapt it to your service, and do not paste it unchanged.

1. Scope

Scope sets who is bound and where. It should cover videos, comments, profiles, usernames, messages, live rooms, groups, gifts and any link a member posts. It should say the rules apply to every member regardless of status, including hosts and staff-affiliated accounts. It should state the minimum age, matching your store listing and your age checks.

Sample wording (ours, adapt it): These guidelines apply to everything you post or do on [Service], including videos, live sessions, comments, messages, groups, profile text, usernames and links. They apply to every account, including creators with large followings. You must be at least [18] years old to use [Service]. If you break these guidelines we may remove content, limit features or close your account, as set out in the enforcement section.

2. Prohibited content

This is the floor. It is the list of things removed in every case, with no debate about opinion. Keep it short enough to remember and specific enough to apply. A workable core for a community video app:

• Illegal content. Material that is unlawful where you operate or where it is viewed, including fraud and offers of illegal goods.
• Child safety. Any sexual content involving minors, sexualized depictions of minors, grooming, or content that puts a child at risk. This is reported to the authorities as the law requires.
• Threats and violence. Credible threats, incitement, and content that celebrates serious harm to named people.
• Harassment and hate. Targeted abuse, stalking, doxxing and attacks on people for who they are.
• Self-harm. Content that encourages or instructs suicide or self-injury. Allow support and recovery talk; remove promotion.
• Impersonation. Pretending to be another person or organization to deceive.
• Non-consensual intimate content. Sexual imagery shared without the consent of the people shown.
• Spam and scams. Fake giveaways, gift or coin fraud, repeated unsolicited promotion, and payment-off-platform schemes.
• Copyright and trademark abuse. Uploading others' work you have no right to use.
• Dangerous organizations and weapons trade. As defined in your market.

Sample wording (ours, adapt it): We remove content that threatens or incites violence, targets a person or group for abuse, shares private information to harm someone, sexualizes minors in any way, shows sexual content without the consent of the people in it, promotes self-harm, or impersonates another person to deceive. We remove it whatever the poster's follower count or standing. We report child safety material to the relevant authorities.

Write each item as a behavior, not a topic. "Targeted abuse of a person" can be applied; "offensive content" cannot. Add one example of what is not covered so members see the line: "heated disagreement with a public figure's statement is allowed; calling for harm to them is not".

3. Restricted content

Restricted content is legal but needs handling. It is where a permissive brand shows its care. For an adult-leaning community, typical restrictions are:

• Mature themes. Strong language, adult discussion and violence in news or fiction, allowed for verified adult audiences with a label.
• Graphic news or documentary footage. Allowed with a warning screen and not in recommendations.
• Sexual content. Whether you permit any is a business and store decision; stores restrict it tightly, so many apps remove it or confine it to clearly incidental use.
• Gambling, alcohol and regulated goods. Allowed only where lawful, age-gated and with disclosure.
• Political and issue advertising. Sponsored posts must be labeled as sponsored.
• Medical and financial claims. Opinions are allowed; claims that a product cures or guarantees returns are not.

Sample wording (ours, adapt it): Some content is allowed but limited. Posts with graphic imagery, strong language or mature themes must be labeled by the creator or by us, may be hidden behind a warning, and are not recommended to people who have not chosen to see them. Sponsored content must say it is sponsored.

4. Live sessions

Live rooms need their own section because nothing can be reviewed beforehand. State three things: what hosts can do, what viewers must do, and when staff step in. Our companion guide to moderating a live streaming app covers the tooling in depth.

• Host powers: mute, remove or block a viewer, limit chat to followers, hide comments, end their own stream.
• Host duties: the host is responsible for what is shown and said in their room, and for the guests they bring in.
• Viewer duties: the same rules as everywhere, plus no chat flooding and no begging for gifts in a way that deceives.
• Staff powers: to end any stream, to hold replays, and to restrict a host while a report is reviewed.

Sample wording (ours, adapt it): You are responsible for what happens in your live room. You may mute, remove and block viewers. We may end a live session at any time if it appears to break these guidelines, and we may hold its recording while we review. Do not mislead viewers about what a gift buys or where payments go.

Define the cut-off speed you aim for on the most serious reports in your internal procedure, not in the public text, so you do not promise what staffing cannot deliver.

5. The enforcement ladder

A ladder says what happens, in what order, for how long. It makes the first response proportionate and the last response defensible. A practical five-step ladder:

Severe harm skips steps. Say so in the text: "We may remove content or close an account without warning where the harm is serious." Our guide on moderating an online community at scale explains how to keep the ladder fair when many reviewers apply it.

Sample wording (ours, adapt it): When we find a breach we choose the response that fits the harm. We may send a note, remove content, restrict features, suspend an account or close it. We may skip steps where the harm is serious. We keep a record of each action and tell you which guideline applied.

6. Reporting and appeals

Reporting is the store requirement and the heart of the system. Tell members where the button is, what categories exist, what happens next and what they will hear back. Appeals are the counterpart: they protect members from mistakes and protect you from the claim that decisions are arbitrary.

• Where: every video, comment, profile, group and live room has a report option.
• Categories: they should match the prohibited list, plus "other".
• What the reporter gets: a confirmation and, where practical, a result.
• Who the affected member hears from: a notice stating the rule, the action and the way to appeal.
• Appeal review: by a different person from the original decision-maker, within a stated target.
• Contact: a published address for safety and legal notices, which Apple's guideline asks for.

Sample wording (ours, adapt it): Use the report button on any video, comment, profile, group or live room. Choose the category that fits best. We review reports and tell you the outcome where we can. If we act on your content, we will tell you which guideline applied and how to appeal. A different reviewer will look at your appeal, and we will reply within [number] days. For safety or legal notices write to [address].

The Santa Clara Principles, a civil-society framework, ask for exactly this shape: clear rules, notice to affected users that names the rule, and appeal with human review by someone not involved in the first decision. See the Santa Clara Principles for the full text. They are voluntary, not law, but they give a reasonable benchmark.

7. Transparency

Transparency means keeping records and, when you are ready, publishing a summary. Begin with what you can count honestly: reports received by category, actions by type, appeals and how many were overturned, and the median time to first action. Share a short quarterly note with creators. It signals fairness, trains staff to log their decisions and gives your counsel what they need if a regulator asks. The same principles call for publishing these numbers regularly, split by type of violation. You do not need a glossy report at launch; you need the log.

Sample wording (ours, adapt it): Each quarter we publish the number of reports we received, the actions we took by type, the number of appeals and the share that led to a reversal.

Writing a stance that is permissive on opinion and strict on harm

The hardest drafting job for a conversation-heavy brand is the sentence that explains your stance. Three habits help.

1. Define the line by conduct and consequence, not by viewpoint. "We do not remove posts for being unpopular or offensive to some. We remove posts that threaten, target or deceive."
2. Give a pair of examples for every rule. One allowed, one removed, written close together so the contrast is clear.
3. Say what you will not do. "We do not remove lawful opinion because an advertiser, a government or a crowd dislikes it, except where the law requires." Only promise this if you will keep it; hold the exception for legal orders.

Mistakes to avoid

• Promising "no moderation" in marketing, then removing content under rules nobody read.
• Rules that name topics, like "politics", instead of behaviors.
• Different treatment for large creators, written or unwritten. Visible double standards end trust fastest.
• A ladder with no appeal, or an appeal reviewed by the same person.
• Copying another service's text, including its tool names and legal references.

Policy-to-tool map

A rule with no tool is a wish. Map each rule to a report type, an action and a decider.

Our admin panel supports this mapping. Members can report videos, comments, profiles and live sessions, and admins review them in a queue, applying warnings, removals, strikes or bans that are logged. Roles let you keep content review separate from payments access. The Clapper clone moderation tools and features page lists the controls, and we configure the report categories, strike thresholds and review roles for your build to match the policy you write.

Store and legal rules to check

Which laws apply depends on where you operate and where your members live. Ask counsel; this is not legal advice. These are the questions to put to them, with the primary source for each.

• Copyright notice and takedown (United States). The Copyright Office's section 512 page describes how a service that hosts user content responds to takedown notices, registers a designated agent whose details are posted publicly, and adopts a repeat infringer policy. Our post on copyright and DMCA for a video sharing site covers the process.
• Child sexual abuse material (United States). 18 U.S.C. 2258A sets a duty for providers to report apparent material to the NCMEC CyberTipline once they have actual knowledge.
• EU Digital Services Act. The Commission's DSA page says platforms need an easy-to-use way to report illegal content, must explain removals with a statement of reasons and must offer ways to appeal. Duties scale with size, and smaller companies have lighter obligations.
• UK Online Safety Act. The government explainer describes duties on user-to-user services to reduce illegal content, protect children and offer reporting and complaints routes, scaled to size and risk.
• Your own region. Many countries have their own platform or privacy rules, and you may be bound by the rules of every country where you operate.

For terms that creators accept, see creator terms, takedowns and content ownership.

Adult audiences and age gating

An app aimed at adults still has to prove it. Apple's guideline 1.2.1 asks apps with creator content to let users identify content above the app's age rating and to use age restriction, verified or declared, to limit underage access. Google Play expects age screening where mature material is incidental. In practice:

1. Set the store rating and the listing to match what your guidelines allow.
2. Collect and check age at sign-up in the way your market expects, and record how.
3. Treat suspected minors as a priority report category, with a clear step to restrict or remove the account.
4. Keep adult-only rooms and mature labels behind the age gate.

How strict to be, declared age or an identity check, is a decision for you and counsel. Our guide on age verification for social media apps compares the options. We set up stricter age checks and country-specific access for your build; the exact scope is confirmed with you at kickoff, via our contact page.

How to draft, test and ship the policy

1. Draft the one-page summary first. If you cannot state a rule in one sentence, it is not ready.
2. Write the long version with examples. Use real cases from your first beta group.
3. Map each rule to a report type in your admin, using the table above.
4. Run a tabletop test. Give five staff the same ten sample reports and compare decisions. Rewrite rules where answers differ.
5. Review with counsel for your regions, then publish the text and the contact address.
6. Set review dates. Revisit the document after the first 90 days and whenever the stores or laws change.

Worked example, using invented numbers: say you open to 5,000 members and 10% post weekly, which is 500 posters. If 2% of posts draw a report, and each member posts twice a week, that is about 20 reports a week. One reviewer can clear that in a few hours. If a live event brings 50 reports in an evening, you need the second reviewer on call. Size the process for the busy night, not the average week.

Once you have a policy, the next step is to pair it with the business model in how Clapper makes money and the alternatives in apps like Clapper, read the Clapper clone business model, then start from the Clapper clone script and set your rules before launch.