I have seen users were punished because of a sin they have done 3+ years ago. I think it was plagiarism. I am not against punishment but once a user establish themselves worthy and contributing the forum from long years the forum owe them. Punishing them for a sin that was done years ago is unfair.
I too think when reporters are reporting, they should deal with recent posts and when mods are moderating then they should not go back for x amount of time. I understand people will have different opinions.
Most of permanent bans come from plagiarism, and most of recent months ban appeal threads closed when proof of plagiarism found. More details about plagiarism in my topic, and there are a few contributive factors for second chance after permament bans because of plagiarism.
[TIPS] to avoid plagiarismYou actually can take your second chance with temporary ban and signature ban for one or two years. You can get it or not, depends on your past activities (things presented below are not mine, I describe perspectives of global mods that I read during the banwave in many appeals). There are some factors:
- Total posts that you plagiarised.
- Percentage of plagiarised posts / your total posts (more than half - 50% - will wipe out your second chance, surely)
- Time points of your plagiarism (before or after the rule on plagiarism applied in the forum)
- Your past contributions.
Globals can now issue sig bans so it'll happen more often but isn't going to be a let off for everyone (so if half your posts are copy and pastes then forget about it but people who are getting banned for one or two posts from years ago will likely be shown some mercy).