How to edit and manage your profile

Getting the most out of your Virgin Media profile Your Virgin Media profile is all about YOU. It’s your chance to express yourself to other Virgin Media members and the rest of the world. You decide how much info you fill out on your profile but we suggest you make it as full as possible so others can get a real sense of who you are and what's important to you. Go ahead, show off! Getting Started How do I register to create a profile? Updating your personal information, favourite things and online photos How do I fill out my basic info? How do I upload or update my profile picture? How do I add my favourite things to my profile? Friends & Acquaintances Can I include online friends in my profile? What’s so great about friends? How can I create friendships? How do I create groups for my friends? Why have acquaintances when I can have friends? Keeping in touch with your friends: managing your messages and guestbook How do I send messages to my friends? How do I create a guest book? Can I moderate the entries in my guest book? How do I filter words? What are my moderation options? Customising the layout of your profile How do I change the layout of my profile? How do I change access restrictions? How do I move the modules? Updating your privacy settings to manage who can see your information What are my privacy options? Getting started How do I register to create a profile? Just register your details and a screen nickname and we’ll create a space for your profile. Then you can update and edit your profile as and when you wish to. Return to top of page Updating your personal information, favourite things and online photos First things first - before you start editing, updating and playing around with your profile you should create a guestbook. You don't have to place the guestbook on your profile page, but activating this feature unlocks many of the functions below so it's worth a quick click before you start. To find out how to do this see the information below. The updates made below will appear in the My Profile, Personal, Contact Details and My Message Boards sections of your profile page. How do I fill out my basic info?

• Under the ‘Profile‘ heading on the left of the page, Select ‘Basic information’. From here, you can enter new details or update your personal information that appears alongside your nickname and profile picture.
• Use the check boxes next to each entry to indicate whether you want that information displayed to others viewing your profile (see Privacy Settings for more information).
• Following your changes or additions, click ‘Save Changes’ at the end of the page

Details you enter here will become part of our searchable member profiles index. So, the more information you give us, the easier it will be for friends to find you and get in touch! Please note: it may take up to 1 hour for changes made here to be reflected in our searchable member profiles index. Return to top of page How do I upload or update my profile picture?

• Under the ‘Profile‘ heading on the left of the page, select ‘Profile Picture’. From here, you can upload the picture that will be displayed on your profile page.
• To upload your image, click on the ‘Browse...’ button and select an image (GIF or JPG format, less than 72K bytes in size) from your computer. Select the image and scroll down to the end of the page and click ‘Update’.
• When the page reloads, you should see the image you’ve chosen plus a message reading ‘Photo Updated’ near the top of the page.
• If you do not choose a picture then our default will be used. Alternatively, if you do not have an image, you can choose from a selection of silhouettes we’ve created.
• To delete your profile picture, just click ‘Remove Photo’.
• If you wish to change your photo at any time, simply upload a new photo and it will automatically replace the current profile picture.

Please Note: You are not allowed to upload pictures unless you own the copyright for them. So no uploading stuff you find on the Internet. Also, you're not allowed to upload pictures that have been taken inside sports stadiums, so if you're going to put up a picture of Rooney, make sure it's one you took of him in the street and not him lobbing one in from 25 yeards at Old Trafford. Return to top of page How do I add my favourite things to my profile? The updates made below will appear in the Favourites section of your profile page.

• This bit is all about the stuff you like: favourite bands, websites, movies, books etc. For each one, use the box on the right to type in a favourite, then click 'Add'.
• If you want to change the order of items on a particular list, click on the item to highlight it and select 'Move Up' or 'Move Down'.
• Use the checkboxes to show or hide an item.
• When you’ve finished making changes and/or additions, click on ‘Save Changes’ at the end of the page.

Info you enter here will become part of our searchable member profiles index. So the more information you give us, the easier it will be for people to find you and get in touch! Please note: it may take up to 1 hour for changes made here to be reflected in our searchable member profiles index. Return to top of page Friends & Acquaintances The updates made below will appear in the My Friends section of your profile page. Can I include online friends in my profile?

• You can invite anyone on Virgin Media to be your friend, and any Virgin Media member can invite you to be a friend. In either case, both members must approve before they become friends.
• Just because someone asks you to be your friend, it doesn't mean that person should be privileged to appear on your profile or see the private areas of your profile.
• If you invite somebody to be your friend and they decline (or never respond), you can still keep them as an acquaintance.
• Under the ‘Community Centre’ heading on the left of the page, select ‘My Friends’ to manage your friend requests.

Return to top of page What’s so great about friends? Creating friends is a powerful feature of online communities. Being friends with other users means:

• you will appear on each other's profile pages, making it easier for other users to find people with common interests, make connections or track down mutual friends.
• you can communicate quickly with your friends.
• you can expose certain parts of your profile only to your friends (like the pictures from that party last night ;-) ).

Return to top of page How can I create friendships?

• Find the profile of someone you want to be your friend by searching for them or spotting them on a mutual friend’s profile.
• Click ‘add as friend’ on their profile page.
• Select one or more groups to put him/her in.
• Click ‘update’.

Or...

• Select ‘manage your profile’, and go to the ‘My Friends’ page.
• Click ‘add friend or acquaintance’.
• Enter the person's nickname and select one or more groups to put him/her in.
• Click ‘update’.

Return to top of page How do I create groups for my friends? You create new groups on the ‘My Friends’ page. Groups are a good way to organise your friends. Friends and acquaintances can appear in more than one group. For instance, you might put ‘ChessQueen23’ in your ‘Friends’ group and also in your ‘Knitting Buddies’ or ‘Poker Buddies’ group.

• Once you've added ChessQueen23, or any friend, she needs to accept.
• The next time she goes to her ‘Profile Controls’, she'll see a message telling her that she has a new friend request.
• If she accepts, the next time you check your ‘My Friends’ page, you two will automatically become friends.

Return to top of page Why have acquaintances when I can have friends? People won't always accept friendship requests, or may change their minds later. If someone denies your request or later removes you from his/her list of friends, that person will then be listed as an acquaintance, rather than a friend.

• Acquaintances can’t see profile elements that are set to only be visible to friends.
• Until the person you've requested to be a friend decides whether to accept or deny the request, he or she will be listed as an acquaintance (with a note that a request is pending).
• You can always re-send friendship requests to acquaintances.
• An acquaintance might also be a teacher or celebrity whom you want to ‘bookmark’ so you can link to his/her profile easily, though he/she or you don't necessarily want to maintain a close friendship.

Return to top of page Keeping in touch with your friends: managing your messages and guestbook Sending messages to your friends is a great way to keep up-to-date with the people you meet on the boards. Think of sending a message as leaving a voicemail for them so they’ll know what you’re up to, even if you’re not online to chat to. How do I send messages to my friends?

• Under the ‘Community Centre’ heading on the left of the page, select the ‘My messages’ to access your private messages.
• Messages are sent, received and replied to just like emails.
• To delete a message, click on the red 'X' icon on the right side of the page. To reply to the sender, click on the arrow icon.

Return to top of page How do I create a guest book?

• Before you can manage your guest book, you need to have actually created one.
• Select ‘Create Guest Book’ in the ‘Guest Book’ section on the left of the page.
• Give your guest book a name and then click ‘Update’.

Return to top of page Can I moderate the entries in my guest book? You can control whether or when new entries are added to your guest book. By default, your guest book is open to anybody who wants to add a comment. If you want, you can review all messages posted to your guest book, or only those with words you may find offensive.

• To change the moderation setting, select ‘Moderate Messages’ in the ‘Guest Book’ section on the left of the page.
• Click ‘Change’ to ‘Current Moderation Setting.’ Use the drop-down list to change the setting as desired.

Return to top of page How do I filter words?

• Select ‘Word Filtering’ in the ‘Profile’ section on the left of the page.
• Scroll to ‘Suppressed Words List’ and edit the words in the text box.

Return to top of page What are my moderation options?

• If you change your moderation settings to ‘Moderate all postings’ you'll need to come back to the moderation settings page periodically to review and release guest book entries.
• If you set moderation to ‘Postings with filtered words’, you'll only need to review and release those guest book entries that include words in your filtered words list.

Return to top of page Customising the layout of your profile How do I change the layout of my profile? Layout Manager helps you customise your profile by re-arranging the modules that make up the page. Each part of your profile is represented by a module, for example ‘My profile’, ‘Shout Outs’, ‘Contact Details’, ‘Guest Book’ and ‘Favourites’.

• Select ‘Layout Manager’ in the ‘Profile’ section on the left of the page, (Note: you won't see this option if you haven't enabled your photo album or guestbook).
• Each module has three icons at the top: The first from the left shows access restrictions on that module. Next, the key icon in centre helps you to set access restrictions. The last icon on the right - 'x' - allows you to hide the module.

Return to top of page How do I change access restrictions?

• By selecting the key icon in centre, you're given a drop-down menu that lets you change access restrictions for that particular module.
• Select the setting you want, then click on the ‘done’ button.
Please note: this option does not control access to your ‘My Friends’ page, ‘photo gallery’ or ‘Blog, just what bits of these sections people can see on your main profile page. In Layout Manager you control access to the parts of your profile that are shown on the profile page itself. For instance, in Layout Manager you can say that only logged-in members should be able to see the excerpt from your blog. Whereas in the Manage Access page you can say that only friends should be able to see your entire blog. To use the ‘Manage Access’ controls see What are my privacy options? Return to top of page How do I move the modules?
• To move a module, drag its icon by the tab to the column where you want it to appear.
• When a blue bar with a white downward arrow appears, release the tab to place the module.
• If you want to remove a module from your profile altogether, click 'x' in the upper-right corner of the icon.
• Once you’re happy with your new setup, click ‘Save’.
Return to top of page Updating your privacy settings to manage who can see your information What are my privacy options? Once you have uploaded pictures of yourself and your friends, you can decide who can see this information as well as other areas such as your guest book and friends pages. You can manage access to your profile so that any Virgin Media users can check out your pictures or just close friends decided by you.
• Under the ‘Community Centre’ heading, select ‘Manage Access’ to manage who can see your My Friends page, Photo Galleries and Guest Book.
• For each area (photos, friends etc), select who you want to have access from the drop-down menu and then click ‘Update’.
• Changing these settings means that even if you add the My Photos section to your main profile page using the Layout Manager, (so people can see you have photos to look at), they will not be able to click through and look at them unless you decide they can.
Please note: this page does not control how these features show up on your main profile page. See the’ Layout Manager’ section for those options. Return to top of page