Topic: Alternatives to Permabans for plagarism - page 7. (Read 22177 times)

That's not a solution. 1 of 20 is still horrible and who's gonna track the ~1000 users every week?

Then it's equivalent to permaban for those users - great. But it gives the option for the few that might be genuinely remorseful.

It should be a high enough amount to force most shitposters into a voluntary permaban. 50-100 should do it. If one or two buy/hack/etc enough merits to get back to spamming we'll get them next time. Now that I think about it - if someone wants to waste merits (legit or not) on this - more power to them.

I voted for the merit option AND to keep as is. Not my fault that voting options are bipolar

If the member isn't citing Wikipedia as the source, then I don't see any difference at all between those two cases.  I've seen a lot of cases where people are copying stuff from all over the internet in order to answer questions and passing it off as their own original answer.  That's plagiarism.  The text spinning stuff is more devious, but we're talking about the difference between a criminal who leaves his fingerprints all over the doorknob vs. one that tries to clean up the crime scene--the offense is the same.

I don't think there's a problem with the way things are now, except that not all plagiarizers are created equal and there are two that I know of that I wish had gotten some leniency--but I also understand how important it is to be consistent with rule enforcement.

Hilariousandco, you know that when people get permabanned, they go right back to doing it with a new account.  Hell, you've even suggested it a few times and I've begged you not to give that kind of example to people.  So I don't think a signature restriction would work at all--they'll just abandon the account.  The merit solution has problems, too, unless it's a very high amount.  We know merit gets traded and sold. 

Part of me wants to see leniency for established members who may have fucked up early on.  Maybe there could be an amnesty date set somewhere in 2016 or something, i.e., if you plagiarized after x/x/16 but have a good post history/positive trust/[insert whatever else here], you'll be banned like everyone else.  It's definitely a tough call, because if you show mercy to some based on subjective standards, there's going to be an outcry from those who didn't get any mercy (and probably other members, too). 

I voted for keeping things as they are.

I actually already posted a potential solution to this

I don't think it's a large percentage. Do you have data to support that?

And even if true that doesn't mean they haven't copy-pasted for the 3-4 years since and it's nearly impossible to prove.


I wouldn't worry about that too much. How many of the 5000 users who get banned every month would be able to claw their way back via merit abuse? Would they even do that on an account that already has one strike? Seems far more plausible to create or buy a new one. But this could work for genuine "mistaken" users.

As LoyceV said, merit can be received through abuse and it can't be a solution (Although I have voted for that option too before reading the discussion). I think the current rule should be continued since copy/paste is really a bad practice.

I like the idea of a temporary ban or disable the signature temporary. Nobody is perfect, and everyone surely made mistakes. Giving permanent ban on one person who does not deserve it, is far worse than banning 10 bots (just figuratively).

But who will determine whether a person deserves a permanent ban or not? Staff? DT member?

But how to find out that the user really "forget" add a link and quotation marks or s/he did it intentionally?
Anyway I agree that administration could make a warning to members and not banning them in controversial cases.
This warning message could be displayed under the user's avatar or instead of a signature, as it was suggested above.

How do we determine it's a single case of a copy and paste? Let's say user X has 5000 posts and he is caught and reported for just 1. How do we know that there are no other plagiarized posts? Who will audit these many messages and prove that it's "just one silly mistake"? Note that different plag. checkers give different results. What you get with plagium and seotools may differ from a quick custom google search. Then there are the spinning tools which are very hard to catch, let alone many other ways to fool detection.

I can't believe that there are five people who voted "Pay some sort of fine". That is some bullshit!

Oh, I said that because a large %age of the highly ranked member that gets banned were for post made as further back as 3-4 years,

Yes, but that'd be up to the delegates to decide. I'm sure that regardless of how irrational a reputable member's opinion could be, they'all are against serial-plagiarist/spammers and it shouldn't be too hard to detect when one is found, considering how the plagiarists thread get busted with their copied post almost instantly after they create a thread to the know why they got banned.

I would be in favor of forcing users to pay a fine to get unbanned along with possibly a second fine to have signatures reenabled. Also, the users signature would have less functionality than it would normally otherwise have. One option might be to have a ban result in negative merit and activity to keep things fairly simple.

I am not a huge fan of the merit system, but if it remains, it would be logical for merit to play a role in being able to use a meaningful signature again. 100 merit is probably too high though as very few have received this much merit.

I voted for "No" because I don't think that current punishment system is bad. But your ideas is worth to discuss. That's true that people make mistakes and sometimes they copy paste not intentionally - they forget to provide link of source or something.
Maybe if only 1 copied post was found, user should be banned temporary - for one month for example. If there are more copied posts - ban should be permanent without any questions and excuses
About signature bans - permanent ban of signature for most users here is almost same thing like ban of bitcointalk account. Getting signature back by accumulating x number of merits - I don't think it's good idea, because Merits can be bought or received in other dirty methods. And in many cases ban of signatures wouldn't help - if it was Newbie caught, ban of signature wouldn't affect his account until he will receive 1 or more Merit.
Paying a fine to get unbanned sounds bad to me. Ok, user will pay a fine and he will able to continue copy pasting until he will be caught again? And what's next - he will pay again and story continues. And I'm almost sure that theymos would reject this idea. He said that forum and he don't need for more money and all accounting of forum money gives him enough headache.

Yes.

And only apply that to users who actually have a signature to lose, e.g. Sr. and up. Lower ranks should stay permabanned. Most plagiarism is done by newbies so they wouldn't be deterred by a sig ban.

I would imagine many shitposters would simply abandon such accounts and try to buy new ones.


There is no feasible way to detect that.


Highly subjective and would just devolve into massive flame wars.

Here are my thoughts,
1. When and How often the plagiarism was committed should have a huge impact in it's consequence; I have seen not just (absurdly) highly ranked member but established and reputable get banned for a post they copied as way back as they could not even remember. ChiBitCTy is perfect example, A lot, if not most users that are on the forum were driven by the motive to earn, and ignorant to forum rules initially, but some along the line discover that there's more to the forum than just earning, Do you think they don't they don't deserve a second chance ? I think they do, Some are willing to let go of their sig space since that's the reason they had plagiarized at first, just so they could be accepted back on the forum what more could we want, it should come at a cost but not their account or the reputation they've managed to build along the line after a considerable bad start.

A user that's only motivated to earn, will always find it easier to buy another account(s) no matter how many times they get banned, but an established/reputable member gets to lose everything they have built. A reputable member shouldn't have plagiarized in the first instance ? Of course! That's why I stated that when the offense was committed should be taken into consideration. Because logically, the forum has more too lose in ChiBitCTy being banned (for a single and very old post), than several other legendary accounts being banned for consistent plagiarism.


2. On what could be a solution, is just like that the trust system. It should be debatable there should a be forum delegate of up to 5 - 10 on necessary cases only (It doesn't have to be a forum mods, as I guess there hands are filled) that'd would decide if it should be a permaban, ban or sigban (with duration or not) subjected to their understanding of the plagiarists reputation putting into consideration
a.) How often the user has plagiarized (and the last copied and pasted post)
b.) The reputation of the user and/or time spent on the forum
c.) Values that user adds to forum (Why or why not they should be allowed)



PS: I'm not appealing on behalf of ChiBitCTy, neither is my post about him, I have never had an encounter and I think he was probably banned before I was a user of the forum. It's rather just an example who could have deserved a second chance, not just in my opinion but, according to a lot of reputable members who would do anything to rid spammers off the forum.

The plagiarists reduce the quality of discussion in the forum, and I do not support their paying a fine day enable them continue spamming the forum. The forum should not profit from such actions.

Disabling signatures is a good option in cases of 'silly mistakes', but when a user regularly copy and pasted contents in order to complete bounty tasks, or to try and gain merits, they should not be given a second chance.
And this category constitutes the majority of bans, very rarely do we see users not wearing signatures get banned for plagiarism.

1 mistake can be done, maybe a permaban is excessive especially when the only one infraction it's done a long time ago without the purpose to scam a signature bounty.
I like the option to disable temporarily or disable till x merits earned.

Of course, if the user is a serial copypaste or text spinner a permaban is necessary.

If you forget once to add a link source or a quote tag yeah that's what I would agree to consider as "a silly mistake" and a permaban is harsh, maybe a 3-5-7 days (or more) ban rule could be added.
Other than that, do we really need alternatives?  A permanent ban is rude ok, but reading plagiarized posts all over the forum is rude for my brain too. Without the permaban rule, the forum would get more spam than BCH transactions.

- sig ban indefinitely but are allowed to post: why not (but if the behavior continues, no question asked, he's kicked out for good)
- to pay a fine: will it really be efficient? If I plagiarize Snoop Dog to make "smoke bitcoin everyday" I will pay a fine, then what? I am free to plagiarize Lady Gaga to make 'BTC, the edge of the glory'

I vote for No, nothing should change, except maybe for people doing a "silly mistake" but I am afraid to see more people creating a thread in Meta for their silly mistake.

Agreed! But those cases are very rare, I think I've seen it only twice in the past year. I would estimate it's less than 0.1% of the plagiarism cases that deserve a second chance, and I don't think this should be something that's offered to all banned accounts.

See this list (with data from last Friday). This includes Merit abusers and already banned accounts.

You mean bump bots?
I think the few cases who deserve a second chance wouldn't be banned in the first place if it wasn't for the massive spam from bump bots and signature spammers. Even without plagiarism they only add spam to the forum, and we're better off without them (and their alt accounts).

Most of them haven't posted for 6 weeks, and I wouldn't be surprised if they're all owned by the same person. That just means someone stops using a fraction of his spam farm until August, then continues again.
Unfortunately, the "banned from signatures" message only shows in their profile. If it would show up under their posts, it would act as a warning to others.

Alternatives:

• Pay (a part of) the fine to whoever reported that user, that will trigger a real witch hunt by giving a financial incentive to report plagiarism.
• Punish a user after an unban with red trust, like you did with Lone Shark.
• I've made this suggestion before: a user banned for plagiarism can get an unban if he reports at least 2 other users for plagiarism, and those users must have a higher Rank than he had. That motivates the spammers to help clean up the forum.

I probably wouldn't be for it if it was just the fine by itself, but if there's two options: you can either pay the fine or earn the merit then I see no issue in that. If you have a problem with the fine for whatever reason then just earn the merit instead.


I think this would be too easy. It would be quite easy to rack up reports given the amount of spam there is here.


Then they would just be permabanned if they're caught doing the same thing. This is an attempt to give them a second chance. There wouldn't be a third.


Not sure what you mean here.


This is just about plagiarisers really. Other spammers can be dealt in other/the usual ways.


Wasn't aware that was happening. Maybe it should be rolled out officially or give Globals the ability to do it since it's probably not something theymos would have time for.


If this was true then the same would be true for permbans, even more so. There's no other option to pay for your sins here once caught for plagiarising so most will just create a new account anyway. At least they've got the option of earning their signature back or paying a fine for it.  

Temporary signature bans will never work.
They will just create an army of bot accounts that will make the job impossible for moderators, you can ban let's say 1000 accounts a day for 90 or 60 days, they will just create 91000 and once you're done with them the first ones will come back online.
Permanently removing the signature will probably mean for 99.999% the same as a ban.

I'm against the fee thing, it might serve a good cause but it just doesn't sound right.

So, just leave it as it is. Plagiarism=Permaban.



Theymos playing around as we speak?

If they have been banned signature temporary until they have earned X merit then they can continue to plagiarize and earn that needed merit to lift the ban of signature so this should be moved from the suggestion.

Best alternative is banning signature temporarily for their first case,if they did second time then permaban the signature,if they really want to help the community then they can post without signatures too.