Uploading a profile photo (also known as an avatar on forums and social media) is actually quite simple using your PC. At the top right hand corner of any page on JWTalk you will see your current photo and Display Name. Click that photo and you will be taken to your public profile page. In fact, you can click on anyone's photo, including your own, to visit a person's public profile page.

When you get to your profile page, your current photo will be displayed towards the left of the cover image, and there will be a little grey icon on the bottom left hand side of your profile photo. Click that icon and you will see a pop-up window with several options for setting your photo.

The following video explains how to add a picture/avatar to your JWTalk account. You have your choice of 1) uploading a photo, 2) grabbing one off the web using a URL, or 3) using your Gravatar account*. Watch the tutorial now...

* Gravatar support has been removed. Also, while we've changed the appearance of our community, the basic functions are the same.

On mobile, the process is very similar. You will click the Menu on the upper right hand corner, then choose Account, and then choose Profile. The little gray icon will be to the left of the cover photo even though your current picture is centered. Click that icon to upload a photo, and then choose the appropriate app on your mobile device to do so.

This is where some mobile users have some difficulty, as not all apps on your device will be user-friendly or cooperative. I know on Android, Files by Google works the best. I'm not sure about Apple devices. If you are having touble, a Staff member will be happy to help you. 

The community feels closer and more enjoyable when we can put a face to the name, and so we look forward to you uploading your profile picture here in our Jehovah's Witnesses online community

Can everybody see my real name and email address on my profile page?

No, absolutely not. Rest assured that only you as well as the JWTalk Staff can see that information. Even though we can see it when we look at our own profile pages, your real name, location, email address, as well as the congregation you attend is hidden from the rest of the community members as well as from guests and search engines that may also visit your profile. Your personally identifiable information is safe and secure, unless you choose to share such personally identifiable information with others on your own.

What if I want to display my actual full name to everyone?

Then you may type out your full name in the first-name-only field of your profile. Whatever you type in the first-name-only field will show not only in your public profile, but also on every post you make in the community.

Of course, we provide this first-name-only field for those interested in protecting their privacy online. While other social networks require you to display your full legal name, we won't. Here on JWTalk we have usernames and are on a first name basis only.

Can I share my email address with others?

You may share your email address through private messages with other forum members, but you may not display your email address in your profile, nor may you publish your email address on a post or status update.

Please remember that we discourage the exchange of personal contact information because while we work diligently to try and make sure that only real active Jehovah's Witnesses join our Jehovah's Witnesses community, non-witnesses still manage to get past our registration hurdles from time to time. Using the internal private messaging system (which does send an email to the recipient) is much much safer. If you are harassed by another member via the internal private messaging system, we can investigate the matter and perhaps take action to keep the JWTalk community clean.

FAQ – Frequently Asked Questions

From time to time questions are raised about this our online community of Jehovah's Witnesses, and this page addresses some of the most common ones. The current questions that have answers on this page include the following…

1. Is this an official website for Jehovah’s Witnesses?
2. When did this site get started?
3. Why did this site go from being a rather private and secret site to a quite public one?
4. Who can participate in the discussion forum?
6. Who can sign up to receive the daily bible text?
7. Is the Branch, a Branch, or the religions leadership aware of this site?
8. Are the elder’s in your congregation aware of this site?
9. Have you ever been contacted by the Branch regarding this site?
10. Do you think the Branch approves of this site?
11. What happened to the recorded talks that forum members were able to download?
12. Is there prepared study material available for meetings on this site that I can download and use?
13. If you were contacted by the Branch to stop the daily text emails, what would you do?
14. What if the Branch started doing Daily Text emails themselves?
15. If you were contacted by the Branch to take down this site, what would you do?
16. Your answers to questions 13 and 15 bother me, what should I do?

1. Is this an official website for Jehovah’s Witnesses?

No it is not. JWTalk is not endorsed by the Faithful and Discreet Slave nor is it maintained by any Branch Office nor any legal entity in use by Jehovah's Witnesses. The official website for Jehovah’s Witnesses is JW.org and you can find accurate information about our beliefs and practices there.

JWTalk is an online community for real Jehovah's Witnesses, but it is independently run by a team of brothers and sisters from around the world.

2. When did this site get started?

JWTalk started as a mere hobby site by a small group of brothers and sisters back in the fall of 2006, being perceived as a continuation of a previous Jehovah's Witnesses discussion forum that had been taken down by it's webmaster. Initially, JWTalk was originally a private, referral only discussion forum for the first couple years but now considered a public community. All registered members have to be Jehovah's Witnesses.

There are only a few discussion forums or social networks out there on the internet that are “safe”, positive, and upbuilding for Jehovah's people, and they are difficult to find. While there are a some email mailing lists for Witnesses, apostates or opposers can also join the list, sit back, and harvest email addresses so they can send out there misleading garbage to you ‘at more convenient time’.

The JWTalk community is primarily a discussion board for real Jehovah's Witnesses only. Your email address and other personal information are NEVER shown to anyone unless you choose to share that information, and even then we require that you do so through the one-on-one private messaging system and not within the public areas of the community. Anyone abusing the private message system to send harmful information to a single individual will be banned. Anyone posting harmful material within the community will also be banned.


3. Why did this site go from being a rather private and secret site to a quite public one?

For a number of reasons. In time, the link to the private members only discussion forum, which had remained a secret for several years, somehow got indexed in Google and Bing. Also, some members would continually lose the secret link to the members only area. As social networking started to rise in popularity, many individuals would turn to social networks to search out brothers and sisters of like faith, only to constantly run into opposers. We decided to make the JWTalk community open to others without a referral from a current member, and to make it the go-to social site for real Jehovah's Witnesses on the web.


4. Who can participate in the discussion forum?

Any active publisher whose JWTalk membership is approved by the Staff. All applicants must fill out the registration form completely and honestly. We reserve the right to control membership as we deem fit.


6. Who can sign up to receive the daily bible text via email?

Anybody. God’s Word is public. The accompanying comments are not entire articles, but snippets that, as far as it seems to us, should fall within Fair Use Laws. We've been sending the days text to your email inbox for several years. However, it is worth noting that the official website of Jehovah's Witnesses now also posts the daily text at http://wol.jw.org


7. Is the Branch, a Branch, or the religions leadership aware of this site?

Yes.


8. Are the elder’s in your congregation aware of this site?

JWTalk is no longer maintained by just one individual, but rather by a team of brothers and sisters, which include those serving as pioneers, ministerial servants, and elders. 


9. Have you ever been contacted by the Branch regarding this site?

We have been indirectly asked to remove certain topics for discussion before.


10. Do you think the Branch approves of this site?

The organization makes it very clear that they can only approve and endorse sites that they themselves maintain. This does not mean that they disapprove either.

Notice this reference…
 

Quote

(Sept 2002 KM)
Internet Web Sites: We have an official Internet Web site: www.watchtower.org. This site is adequate to make information available to the public. There is no need for any individual, committee, or congregation to prepare a Web page about Jehovah’s Witnesses. Some have posted the contents of our publications with all scriptures and references given in full and have even offered copies of convention material on a donation basis. Whether profit is involved or not, the practice of reproducing and distributing publications of Jehovah’s Witnesses in an electronic document is a violation of copyright laws. While some may view this as a service to the brothers, it is not approved and should be discontinued.

Let’s break this down…

“There is no need for any individual, committee, or congregation to prepare a Web page about Jehovah’s Witnesses.”

This is not a web page about the organization known as Jehovah’s Witnesses nor about their beliefs and practices. JWTalk is an independently run online community for Jehovah's Witnesses. You can think of our site as a niche community, discussion forum, or social network for people who are really Jehovah's Witnesses. The views and opinions expressed by community members are their own, and do not necessarily reflect the views and opinions of the JWTalk Staff nor Jehovah's Witnesses as a whole. 

“Some have posted the contents of our publications with all scriptures and references given in full and have even offered copies of convention material on a donation basis.”

We do not host the contents of Watchtower publications here on JWTalk, nor do we share recordings of conventions or assemblies. While some members may choose to donate financially to assist with the costs of software licensing and web hosting, there is no incentive or reward to do so, other than knowing "God loves a cheerful giver" - 2 Corinthians 9:7

Whether profit is involved or not, the practice of reproducing and distributing publications of Jehovah’s Witnesses in an electronic document is a violation of copyright laws.

And again, we do not upload entire publications nor do we allow members to copy and paste entire articles on our Jehovah's Witnesses online community. If you are looking for publications of Jehovah's Witnesses, then please visit the official site at http://www.jw.org which has several publications available to download for free.

But what about the warnings such as those mentioned in the km 7/07 p. 3 Question Box article entitled What are the dangers of using the Internet to associate with someone we do not know?

Such cautionary statements published by the faithful and discreet slave are valid and necessary, and each person needs to meditate on the contents of those articles and make their own conscience decision. While every effort is made to ensure our JWTalk community remains a safe place to for Jehovah's people to associate with one another online, there can be no guarantees that individuals will not post offensive material from time to time, nor can we in any manner that we can completely ensure that registered members are in good standing in their congregations or remain in such good standing beyond the time they registered on this site. We can, however, control content, and take seriously our responsibility to do so. All registered members have the ability to participate in keeping the forum clean.


11. What happened to the recorded talks that forum members were able to download?

Please see the Question Box in the April 2010 Our Kingdom Ministry and read the article Should Jehovah's Witnesses circulate recordings or transcripts of talks?. The library index of recorded talks is no longer visible to members, and the forum that used to be dedicated to exchanging recorded talks has been deleted.


12. Is there prepared study material for meetings available on this site that I can download and use?

We do not prepare and upload study material nor make the answers to meeting parts available as a download. Naturally, as Jehovah's people we like to discuss meeting parts and how to apply them in our lives and you will find such discussions taking place in the community.


13. If you were contacted by the Branch to stop the daily text emails, what would you do?

Although we do not see the likelihood of this happening, we would happily discontinue using material from Examining the Scriptures Daily as part of the Daily Text email list.

14. What if the organization started doing daily text emails themselves?

That would be fantastic! Imagine being able to subscribe to it in whatever language you speak, and have it emailed to you at the appropriate time in your time zone wherever you are in the world. With some planning and some programming, they could make it happen. They should!

In the meantime, Jehovah's Witnesses do make Examining the Scriptures Daily available for download in PDF format at http://www.jw.org - as well as in the JW Library app for Windows, iOS, and Android, as well as on the Watchtower Online Library's landing page at http://wol.jw.org,, not to mention there are other 3rd party Daily Text apps for iPhone's, Android phones and tablets, etc. So we doubt we'll hear anything about our mailing list.

15. If you were contacted by the Branch to take down this site, what would you do?

We moved to this domain in 2006 and they are well aware of our community here. This is not a realistic scenario.

There have been Witness only discussion forums, mailing lists, and message boards, since the mid-90′s, some of which still exist to this day. Brothers and sisters are going to search out other brothers and sisters online and socialize with them, because that is just the way it is. JWTalk and it’s predecessor has been a safe place to do so for several years. If the discussion forum was taken down, it’s members would just start up another one, and perhaps try to be a little more secretive. What would be the point?

The Branch has gone after sites that individuals put up about our beliefs and practices, or those dedicated to distributing study material, publications, and maintaining large libraries of recorded talks. None of this takes place here at JWTalk. The Staff works hard to keep the community in harmony with any and all direction received from the Branch.


16. Your answers to these questions bother me, what should I do?

Stop using the Contact form at the bottom of the page to present us with silly “What if...?” scenarios. If you're not sure about the validity of our Jehovah's Witnesses community, please feel free to look around as a guest. Most areas of JWTalk are visible to the public. If the existence of our JWTalk community bothers your conscience, just navigate away.

We perceive our organization’s leadership as loving, friendly, and above all, the most reasonable people on the face of the planet.

What does it mean to be a "Limited Access User"? 

There are 2 types of membership status here at JWTalk: Full Access and Limited Access. 

When a new member registers to be a member of our community of Jehovah's Witnesses, he is automatically placed in what we call Limited Access. Only a few of the features and privileges that Full Access Users enjoy are not available to them. Of these, the most notable one is that they are in moderation, and any comment they make is held in the queue, until a moderator has first read the post and approved it to be published to the community. Comments made by Full Access Users appear immediately on the board without moderator approval. 

The purpose of this, of course, is to prevent unqualified individuals (i.e. non-witnesses) from registering accounts and posting their thoughtless parroted gibberish to our community. 

A Full Access User who continually violates the terms of the  JWTalk Community Membership Policy  may be placed back in Limited Access mode by any moderator to prevent him from freely posting offensive comments to the board. 


How can I become a Full Access User? 

Wait patiently, and participate freely and often. The Staff will determine your eligibility after a you have been a member for a specific period of time and have made a specific number of posts to within the JWTalk community in order to establish some history with us. 
 

If you feel that you have been overlooked, you can post a topic in the Confidential Talk with the Moderators area. This area let's you communicate issues of concern between you and the Staff only. 

Remember, being a "Limited Access User" does not prohibit you from posting and replying in most areas of our community.

I was bad and I am sorry. How do I get my Full Access privileges back? 

This is determined on a case by case basis. Again, you can post a request in the Confidential Talk forum and discuss this with the Staff.

How can I delete my account?

As is common with almost all forums across the internet, we do not delete user accounts here at JWTalk. However, we can "deactivate" your account for you upon request. Simply visit the Confidential Talk forum and make a post that you would like to leave the JWTalk community.

Here is what will happen if you choose to leave: We will move you to a group called "Former Members". Accounts that get added to the Former Members group can no longer see and read anything in the community, nor have the ability to send and receive private messages. Your profile as well as your posts and replies will say "Former Member" under your name and profile photo.

You'll still be able to log in and communicate with just the Staff via the Confidential Talk forum, where you can request to reactivate your account in case you desire to return in the future. In order to view the public areas of our Jehovah's Witnesses online community, you will have to log out in order to view the community as any other unregistered guest.

Can I make all my posts disappear from the forums?

No, your posts and replies cannot be deleted. This is per the JWTalk Community Membership Policy that you agreed to when you applied for membership. This is standard practice across all forums and most social networks, because removing your contributions to a topic will make it confusing for others to follow the discussions that had taken place. Because this is the case, the software we use for our Jehovah's Witnesses community doesn't include such a mass delete function.

Can I get my account back if I change my mind?

Yes you can. When you log in again, you will only be able to see a single forum called "Confidential Talk". You can post a request in there that your account be re-enabled. Upon reactivation, you will be able to see and participate in all areas of our JW community as well as access your Private Messages.

If you have never posted or added any content at all and you abandon your account, it will eventually be deleted. A few times each year, we purge old accounts with zero posts and who have not returned in several months.