A little “cleaning” of the plugin and theme search is very welcome!

the latest updates of which are more than six months old.

Why would that matter at all? Plugins that have not been updated are just as functional.

Yes, You are right!
But why make really dated plugins coexist with those recently updated and which will undoubtedly be the most sought after?
It’s just a big confusion!
We try to listen to your invitations and appreciate that you are striving to make people understand that they need to keep their themes and plugins up to date; but then you continue to propose the old one, even 12 years old.
It’s something that I think is counterproductive and absurd!
Among other things, you should also look for a solution for the search terms; it is certainly not nice to see results appear with “pears”, when I asked for “apples”.

The search here is lacking and I know it sounds trite but honestly: good search here is not easy. It’s been a thing for many years.

This part though:

But why make really dated plugins coexist with those recently updated and which will undoubtedly be the most sought after?

The search should work for functional requirements. There are no “most sought after”. If someone searched for a plugin for a contact form, that search should show contact form plugins and not exclude old plugins.

Part what I mean is that it is never good when plugin developers try to game the search here. This place is not a plugin market, it’s for regular users to find what they are looking for. That search should include old plugins.

Forgive me,
the only thing that is clear to me is that in the discussion there are two opposing views, which cannot be reconciled with each other.
Since whoever has the knife on the side of the handle is YOU, for me it is useless to insist, I would hurt myself!
You can safely continue to reiterate old hypotheses, but know that I was hoping for a clear opening to the idea of IMPROVING.
Ciao!

Your part though:

that search should show contact form plugins and not exclude old plugins

I would like to make it clear that for me, when I refer to “old plugins” I only mean plugins that have not been updated for a long time (from 6 months to more than 12 years), therefore not dependent on the publication date, but on their actual update value.
Keeping the list as it is, means that WorPress endorses the idea that we don’t need to update, while, on the other hand, it strives to always make the appropriate security and functionality changes.
Good day!