Possible root cause of permanent bans because of plagiarism made years ago

[tranthidung]

I saw that thread, made by the head admin, theymos, from which I think it is probably one of main reasons why Hero or Legendary accounts that permanently banned recent months by their posts years ago.
Please report newbies who are copying old posts

To avoid newbie restrictions, people sometimes post exact copies of old posts. Someone recently started spamming such clone posts. If you notice people doing this, please report it. This is very difficult to detect, so we need help. In your report, please include a link to the original post that is being copied if possible.

Thanks.

It is likely that they made it years ago to avoid Newbie restrictions. For more details on Newbie Jails (years ago), please see:

Newbie restrictions (Please discuss forum policy here.)
Newbie restrictions
End of newbie restrictions; ban changes

Note:
What I pointed out here is plagiarism years ago (not recent months, not now) and probably most common root cause.

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[PrimeNumber7]

There are many root causes of plagiarism.

The ultimate root cause is financial incentives. People hope to use plagiarism to achieve financial gain. I would hypothesize this is primarily those making posts in exchange for payment, primarily for advertising in their signatures, but may also be otherwise promoting a service/business.

Others may be testing AI programs and other automated scripts to generate text. This technology is quickly evolving.

[AB de Royse777]

# Increase activity, ultimately that was rank back then
# Higher rank means more money
# Lazy posters
# Not willing to learn and contribute
# By born spammer
# Getting paid for posting
# Account farming
There could be many directions to see why people plagiarize. Plagiarism is a disease in my opinion.

But I am against this kind of Ban which caused by an innocent plagiarism long ago. Back then the rules were not enforced the way the forum do now. There should be a limit of time that someone can go back and report. Which some of the mods also partially agree: Is this concerning? This could be a conspiracy too.

[Pmalek]

People hope to use plagiarism to achieve financial gain.

Is it really that difficult to write 2 or 3 sentences on your own on a topic that interests you without cheating!? We have so many different boards filled with threads of every possible genre you don't even need extensive knowledge to be able to participate in the discussions. Threads where all you need to do is express your own opinion and than people can't even do that and they have to copy someone else's. 

[Coyster]

Is it really that difficult to write 2 or 3 sentences on your own on a topic that interests you without cheating!?

It is for some, and those set of users lack the confidence and ability to write out anything that would look meaningful, they then go cheating because they believe the works/write up they stole could earn them merits.

The other set of users are those who find it hard to complete their post on a campaign, and since they are all about the income they get here, they do and would not want a week's "wage" to go by, they go ahead to steal other people's work, using them to complete their posts and then get paid.

[shield132]

People hope to use plagiarism to achieve financial gain.

Is it really that difficult to write 2 or 3 sentences on your own on a topic that interests you without cheating!? We have so many different boards filled with threads of every possible genre you don't even need extensive knowledge to be able to participate in the discussions. Threads where all you need to do is express your own opinion and than people can't even do that and they have to copy someone else's. 

To be fair it's very difficult to write 2-3 sentence when you have zero wish of it and do it for the sake of signature for example, that's the problem. And even worse problem is that there were signature campaigns with normal payments for such people, for example secondstrade and yobit. Also ranking was dependent on activity, when people were creating accounts and leaving them abandoned for a while, number of activity was increasing virtually, all you needed was to post in order to awake those activity points and grow your rank, so copying of others posts was very easy and time saving. After some activity, in late phases they were going to move from copy posts to self written posts, this way there were hiding their past activity, that's all what I can say on old cases.
If anyone does plagiarism now, I have no idea why.

[rhomelmabini]

Is it really that difficult to write 2 or 3 sentences on your own on a topic that interests you without cheating!?

For not a native speaker and have no depth knowledge in regards to the topic and one more thing is for the sake of the quantity of the required amount of post for the paid signature surely that will be hard for some individuals. It's on the individuals' fault and if he/she has been caught copying others content and ban him then that deserves but there are cases the ban been lifted or a signature ban is applied to those users that deemed to be good or asset to the forum.

Years ago or not plagiarism is still plagiarism.

[DaveF]

Yeah, going back to 2012 posts to nail someone is BS, I have said it many times.

The flip side of that is you can go back through your posts and change them if you know you did it years ago and are worried.
I have been here with this account for about 5 1/2 years and have ~1500 posts.
If I'm not sure about something from 2015 I could hit delete. If I'm not sure about something from 2014 I could do a quick edit.
Even if I had to go though all 1500 posts it probably would not be more then a few hours time.

If you know you did or think you did it, you can go back and fix it, if you care.

That is if your higher ranking account means that much to you, take the time and clean it. It's been 6 months since the plagiarizer bans really kicked in. If you are worried about being caught at this point, and have not been hit just fix it.

And yet again, the bans from posts from years ago are BS.

-Dave

[philipma1957]

Yeah, going back to 2012 posts to nail someone is BS, I have said it many times.

The flip side of that is you can go back through your posts and change them if you know you did it years ago and are worried.
I have been here with this account for about 5 1/2 years and have ~1500 posts.
If I'm not sure about something from 2015 I could hit delete. If I'm not sure about something from 2014 I could do a quick edit.
Even if I had to go though all 1500 posts it probably would not be more then a few hours time.

If you know you did or think you did it, you can go back and fix it, if you care.

That is if your higher ranking account means that much to you, take the time and clean it. It's been 6 months since the plagiarizer bans really kicked in. If you are worried about being caught at this point, and have not been hit just fix it.

And yet again, the bans from posts from years ago are BS.

-Dave

Yeah  the statue of limitations  simply does not exist at all. 

I helped to get people  get unbanned over  older posts  that simply repeated rules to a new person.

Most people don't even understand the definition of plagiarism ie:

  it can't be plagiarism without intent.    <  notice  this statement  it is a fact  and I am sure  it may have been written exactly like this somewhere place on the internet.

So simply listing facts  like:

 it can't be plagiarism without intent.

Is not plagiarism.  going back years to find  statements  that  listed a fact  and saying it is a ban-able offense is not so good to do.

But that is an opinion I have.  I happen to share it with you Dave.

[Pmalek]

For not a native speaker and have no depth knowledge in regards to the topic...

That's why I said earlier that there are so many different boards and threads. Don't talk about topics you know nothing about. If you have never used Linux and Bitcoin core you shouldn't be discussing or copy/pasting how to setup and configure Bitcoin Core on a Linux machine. Just stick to the stuff that you know.
Btw this is not a personal reply to you, it is a general thought.   

[tranthidung]

That's why I said earlier that there are so many different boards and threads. Don't talk about topics you know nothing about. If you have never used Linux and Bitcoin core you shouldn't be discussing or copy/pasting how to setup and configure Bitcoin Core on a Linux machine. Just stick to the stuff that you know.
Btw this is not a personal reply to you, it is a general thought.   

Exactly. Everyone have rights to visit and read posts, threads in any board, but for posting, they should only make their posts in boards that they are familiar with and have enough knowledge about things discussed inside those boards. Trying to join unfamiliar boards and make posts will make posters likely dumb. Honestly I sometimes visit Bitcoin Technical board to read and learn, but I have never posted in that board, because so far I don't have enough knowledge to do that.

[PrimeNumber7]

People hope to use plagiarism to achieve financial gain.

Is it really that difficult to write 2 or 3 sentences on your own on a topic that interests you without cheating!?

No, its not, but plagiarism helps save minutes off the time it takes to write a post, and these several minutes extrapolated over many posts can add up. This adds up even more when someone is intending on spending all his available time writing posts (he is earning all his income from posting). 

[philipma1957]

People hope to use plagiarism to achieve financial gain.

Is it really that difficult to write 2 or 3 sentences on your own on a topic that interests you without cheating!?

No, its not, but plagiarism helps save minutes off the time it takes to write a post, and these several minutes extrapolated over many posts can add up. This adds up even more when someone is intending on spending all his available time writing posts (he is earning all his income from posting). 

You have a legit point if a person has 10 accounts and does ten signature campaigns.

To me I would love a signature holiday 60 days it would allow us to determine how many are posting to earn a living. We could track the drop in traffic and maybe alter signature campaigns for the better.

[PrimeNumber7]

People hope to use plagiarism to achieve financial gain.

Is it really that difficult to write 2 or 3 sentences on your own on a topic that interests you without cheating!?

No, its not, but plagiarism helps save minutes off the time it takes to write a post, and these several minutes extrapolated over many posts can add up. This adds up even more when someone is intending on spending all his available time writing posts (he is earning all his income from posting). 

You have a legit point if a person has 10 accounts and does ten signature campaigns.

To me I would love a signature holiday 60 days it would allow us to determine how many are posting to earn a living. We could track the drop in traffic and maybe alter signature campaigns for the better.

I don't have a problem with anyone earning their living via signature advertising so long as they are posting intelligently and are positively contributing to the overall community with their posts. I would not be surprised to see a few people who make pretty good posts that earn a living from signature advertising, probably from Malaysia, India, or other third world countries. I would not particularly like it if someone was doing this with 10 accounts.

[Lucius]

To me I would love a signature holiday 60 days it would allow us to determine how many are posting to earn a living. We could track the drop in traffic and maybe alter signature campaigns for the better.

That would certainly be an interesting experiment, but I think it is not difficult to predict the results of one such move, many would become inactive or significantly reduce the number of posts. If campaigns start from zero after that, they could pick only active members, but I bet it would be hard to fill all available spots. I do not know did you see Effect of signature bans, where some things can be seen very clearly.

There are many root causes of plagiarism.

There are two things to keep in mind, some users do not read forum rules and plagiarism as a violation of forum rules is completely unknown to them. Perhaps the problem lies in misunderstanding the English language, or is it just laziness. Another thing is that different cultures have different views on different things, so they consider plagiarism as a normal thing. Same as download music, movies, or software without paying which is neither legal nor moral, but it is almost completely normal everywhere in the world.

[Welsh]

Plagiarism is almost always done with intent. There are a few scenarios where users may be quoting a post, and have forgotten to add a source to the post. However,  I would argue that if you haven't added your own views on the quote then it should be treated as plagiarism anyway. If someone has quoted a article for instance, and forgotten to put a source, but still went on to make their own points. I would likely give them the benefit of the doubt. Mistakes happen, and forgetting to quote with the quote tags, and providing a source could happen. However, context is certainly taken when it comes to banning someone. I would also likely put this issue to the admins, and Global Moderators to get their opinion on it.

And yet again, the bans from posts from years ago are BS.

You're responsible for your content that you have posted. Lets give a more extreme version of this. Let's say someone murdered several people many years ago, and they have only now been caught, but the evidence leads back to a few years ago. Wouldn't you want them to be busted? The issue with making cut off points such as 6 months is when a user plagiarized 6 months and 1 day ago. They wouldn't be banned, and would escape by the skin of their teeth. That's also a terrible model to base bans off of, and would cause much more controversy than the current approach.

I much rather the current moderation approach on plagiarism; considering the context, and banning if justified despite how long ago the post may have been made.

Most people don't even understand the definition of plagiarism ie:

  it can't be plagiarism without intent.    <  notice  this statement  it is a fact  and I am sure  it may have been written exactly like this somewhere place on the internet.

So simply listing facts  like:

 it can't be plagiarism without intent.

Is not plagiarism.  going back years to find  statements  that  listed a fact  and saying it is a ban-able offense is not so good to do.

But that is an opinion I have.  I happen to share it with you Dave.

Which is exactly why context should be considered. Plus, I highly doubt someone would be banned for saying "Bitcoin is a digital currency". That's not plagiarism like you said. Plagiarism usually results in the user copying content from another user on this forum or elsewhere on the internet (such as articles etc), and not merely using commonly used phrases.

[DaveF]

@Welsh
Below is a snip of the conversation of what I posted back in MAY about the issue.
Short version, he quoted himself IRL & got a ban. Revealing that would disclose who he was, not interested in doing so. Not coming back.

So we loose a good but very occasional poster because of it. But since "we don't monitor scams" we keep having to deal with users like game-protect.

How many other people have we lost.

That's just stupid.

To use your example of murder above. It's like the speed limit on a street it 55. Everyone occasionally does 60 or 65. The cops don't bother you till you hit 70. Then they ticket you. There are cameras that record your speed but are for the most part unchecked. All of a sudden not only are they checking the cameras but they are issuing tickets from 12+ months ago for every time you went 56. THATS the problem.

-Dave

Well there's nothing we can do about that but I'm sure word will spread pretty quick and many users will be reappearing to try claim their accounts back. Most people who got banned are probably still here just on alts so I'm they'll see it. Tell your friend he can appeal if he wants. I'm not sure what you're complaining about here though. Would you rather us not issue sig bans and just leave everyone permanently banned?

No, I agree with the banning. I have an issue with digging up posts from 4 and 5 years ago, hitting people who are not monetizing their sig. You could have hit him with sig ban and he never would have cared.
Or given a 90 day vacation from the forum with a stern warning. Or nuked the posts from 2014.

They can appeal to mods or admins in private if they feel like they can't make their claim publicly.

Discussed that with him. Not interested in anyone knowing who he is IRL.
Not you, not theymos, not anyone. Only reason I know is because I have known him for 30+ 40+ (crap I'm old) years. And he is not real happy with the fact that I know his forum use or the fact that I am talking about it here. But, I think this discussion needs to exist.

The other issue would be that since he has almost no merit and a lower post count it's going to be tough to make a good defense.

Yes, it's a very rare 1 off case, but it's still there. And if I know 1 person who had it happen, I will bet you just about any amount there is at least one more.
Possibly they have had an issue with another forum member and this was a push they needed to leave.
Does their SO think they spend too much time on here and it's an internal excuse to leave?
Did they cash out 18 months ago when BTC was at $20k and just don't care as much?

Could they appeal? yes.
Do they want to? possibly.
Will they because of external factors? perhaps not, or at least not now.

As I said, spamming & plagiarizing now. You're out of here. Once it's over 1500 days old and has not been done since? Temp ban with stern warning or something.

Just my view, take it as you will.

-Dave

[malevolent]

You have a legit point if a person has 10 accounts and does ten signature campaigns.

To me I would love a signature holiday 60 days it would allow us to determine how many are posting to earn a living. We could track the drop in traffic and maybe alter signature campaigns for the better.

This thread can give you an idea how many users in a single signature campaign are posting mostly for money: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5188149.0;all