It’s the default and it takes more than a newton of energy to modify it which would yield less than a newton’s worth of energy of benefit.
Nobody appreciates sarcasm anymore.
Why would a five year old warning figure into a discussion, even if there has been something since?
So you think his complaint is based on his user CP is his default login page and the infraction list is the default user CP display? If thats true then disregard my earlier suggestions.
Anthropological data for moderators of the future.
A really old warning serves as a reminder that really old behavior was unacceptable. Is the post that earned a warning still there? Then why shouldn’t the warning be, as well?
Not to mention, any violation of rule breaking usually has data about it existing somewhere. If you get a traffic ticket or break the law, there is going to be SOME paperwork about it SOMEWHERE, no matter how mild the cause.
In the SDMB, see “mod notes” as “being let off with a warning”, “mod warnings” as “being given a ticket”, and “being banned” as “having your drivers licence revoked”.
In that sense, mod warnings are going to be written about somewhere, regardless of how old it is.
It doesn’t matter if it doesn’t really contribute toward or wager in with new warnings years later…there is nothing wrong with having “all warnings ever gotten, period” on record.
Well that really depends on the jurisdiction. Some places expunge various levels of offense history after a certain amount of time.
Are you saying that the squid is a mod?
No. But the goat may be. (We ain’t sayin’.)
Why would they have to have a purpose? As noted, the offending post is still there as is the moderator’s post that indicated a warning was given. Those aren’t going to be deleted for obvious reasons.
What, you think they should delete them? Automatically or manually? Obviously manually deleting them is a lot of work for no purpose. What would be the purpose of automatically deleting them? So that when the mods are discussing your posting privileges, they aren’t biased by old warnings?
But the thing is, your banning or not banning is not an impartial mechanical process. It’s a subjective decision by the human moderators as to whether your continued presence is a positive or a negative. So show me in the rulebook where it says the moderators can’t consider your complete posting history when deciding whether to ban you or not. Also, I’d like to see the page in the rulebook that prohibits donkeys from kicking field goals.
Warnings show up in an infractions tab in your User CP so any time you go to http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/usercp.php to see if anyone has posted in threads you are interested in or you want to update your signature or whatever, you also get reminded of all the times you fucked up. I imagine DrDeth is merely human and would feel better if when he checks his subscribed threads, he’s not reminded of 5 year old events that he’s not perhaps proud of.
This is pretty much my view on the subject too.
I don’t think anyone’s asking for the original warning posts etc to be erased from history, but basically being reminded every time you log in/see if any of your threads have updated that “You did a bad thing years and years ago!” is not great, especially if said alleged bad thing was not particularly contentious.
Rather than expecting the mods to keep on top of all this stuff themselves, surely a poster should be able to PM one of the mods and say “Hey, I’ve got this years-old warning on my file; I’ve behaved since then, can you scrub it?”
See post #36. A user can make it so they don’t see the warnings in their CP.
Also, to stop getting the pop-up warning, you just need to go in and actually read the warning.
I was warned for disobeying mod instructions in around 2003 (one of the European mods I think but I can’t recall which.) There is absolutely no sign of the warning anywhere in my User CP presumably because, as Colibri points out upthread, the SDMB only started automating the system in 2009. If my infraction is still visible to the mods could one of them tell me which mod did warn me? Don’t worry, I have not suddenly decided to demand satisfaction in the only terms fitting between gentlemen, it just bugs me that I can’t remember his name. 
It was 2005, and you were warned by xash.
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=6350727&postcount=11
Who is Indian, not European.
That’s the guy! And I do remember now that he was indeed an Indian as Chronos says. I just had a vague notion that he wasn’t American. Thank you both!