To Bishonen on her talk page

"Would you mind creating a category for your alt-accounts/sockpuppets? It's hard to keep track of them all. Thanks,"


http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=...oldid=428077150

Some of her sockpuppets:

User:Little Stupid
User:Bishzilla
User:Bishapod
User:Bish and chips
User:Maxypode
User:Ka of Catherine de Burgh
User:Darwinbish
User:Bishzilla/Bishzilla diet
User:Bishonen/Bishapod
User:Baby Stupid
User:Darwinfish

Who cares? Did you create a category for all of your sockpuppets?

Are you asking me?

I don't have any. I thought they weren't allowed.

Admins are a different kettle of fish, since some of them routinely employ the tactic of banning their opponents in content disputes, using the sock accusation. Therefore when those admins sock they should wear some sort of scarlet letter.

Bishonen can be a bit of a troll, but he/she is hardly the worst admin out there.

I'm not saying just her. I'm saying all of them.

Why are admins a special class that are allowed to do this?

I kinda made a proposal in regards to that. I was too pessimistic to think it would actually go anywhere (and it didn't), but I felt that I might as well try.

But it contains a logical inconsistency. Unless editors are required to identify on registration then all that's being registered is a name, not a person. Sockpuppets are socks of a person, not a name.

Well, the proposal wasn't about sockpuppets, but about alternate accounts. There is a difference, albeit a very tiny, almost insignificant one. Sockpuppets by an established user should be grounds for a block, even if people so often weasel out of it because they are established users.

There are categories for socks. I am asking why admins are exempt from this policy? I believe somewhere it says that socks should be declared. Why don't admins have to do this?

That is my question. Like a certain admin. He left editing at all rather than continue editing after his good hand/bad hand sock was identified, even though he was still allowed to use it. His whole problem wouldn't have existed if he had declared his sock to begin with.

My complaint is that admins are exempt from the socking rules, even when they use socks abusively.

You say "potato" ....

As if Ron Ritzsock isn't obvious enough?

This one is actually used as an example of a "humor account" at WP:SOCK#LEGIT.

And I say "Lâche Pas La Patate"

Get the hell over it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=...oldid=405837433

Was there a discussion or consensus for this new exception?

No.

I've been looking for one, but I have yet to find it.

If someone wants to take the time, you might want to check when that part was added in and by whom. If it was added by Bishonen or one of his socks, well...that says more than enough right there.

Nope, by Jehochman. I think it's one of those convention things--after all, the community has tolerated such accounts. Whether for better or for worse, is another story altogether.

I don't know why this is such a big deal to you, Silver. Why make Wikipedia look more legitimate than it really is? If someone wants to have a confusingly long list of "humor" accounts, what's it to you?

I believe Catherine de Burgh and the Ka of Catherine de Burgh are Giano, not Bishonen.

"His"?

Because he's an unflinching bureaucrat with a humour deficiency and needs to lighten up a bit?

Clearly I have the right qualifications then to apply for being a bureaucrat, I should go do that.

Indeed. Lower-case "b"

Remember that time where those guys made new accounts to see how new editors were treated and everyone was all "No fair!"? That was fun.

The addition of "humor" accounts. (first addition), January 11, 2011:

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=...oldid=405882394

Why should admins with multiple "humour accounts still not have to categorize them?

Otherwise, the owner of the sockpuppets is operating incognito, and newbies and editors not in the "in group" are made fools of.

Humour varies across ages, nationalities, etc. Not everyone is British.

Isn't that the definition of trolling?

So shouldn't trolling admins still have to identify their sockpuppets per policy:

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=...oldid=428303113

shouldn't this have been annexed by now?

The Annex is for things that should be discussed on WP. This is such a touchy subject, if you tried to discuss it on WP, you might get shitcanned.

The joke accounts exemption was added by one user to the policy by Jehochman, an admin, with no community concensus.

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=...oldid=405882394


Darwinbish ran for admin. How are new users, or those not in the cabal supposed to make sense of this?


http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=...oldid=407658504

The typical new user is smarter than your feigned cluelessness.

I hate to be a Wiki-lawyer (and I usually don't agree with much of Jehochman's actions), but Jehochman is technically in the right in this case. Wikipedia policies usually begin as de facto common practices and, after a long time, become de jure policies. Early on, Wikipedians just did whatever they thought was best and what they did became policy for good or ill. Jehochman has stated that it is a common practice for Wikipedians to accept (or at least begrudgingly tolerate) alternate humor accounts. Except for a few complaints, there has never been an uprising or community discussion to put an end to alternative accounts or limiting their use. Until then, Darwinfish and friends are free and clear. Unless those accounts act in a way to sway a consensus discussion as a bad sock would, they are only, at worst, annoying. And if being annoying is enough to get people banned from Wikipedia, there would hardly be any Wikipedians left!

It does seem that in recent years, you can hardly sneeze without a community discussion on Wikipedia. That isn't how it was before and it is downright impossible to gather enough of anything you could call "Community consensus" to make any changes. The purpose of the early organic management of Wikipedia (which created "Ignore All Rules") was to avoid bureaucratic entanglements such as getting dozens or hundreds of editors together to change the rules. Alas, there is no balance between the "organic" and "bureaucratic" philosophies on Wikipedia. Another reason the site suffers so.

"See, the thing is, Iridescent falls for the seduction of the dark side of the sock anyway! Once you move away from ''a straightforward "no more than ONE account for anyone and they have to be clearly linked" rule for everyone'', you've lost any chance of getting agreement to it. Some people will give you good reasons for two accounts; some will explain that three are needed. And so on, until you get to six (for 'Shonen, 'Zilla, 'Poddie, the Darwin twins, and a spare). A rule of one would have the saving grace that there's a chance Geogre would still be with us had it existed from the start, but realistically, that's all too late now. Once you've accepted that people need/like having a few accounts, you've got to accept that under current rules Jack is discriminated against. And don't forget that since his socking days of 2007/2008, Jack has consistently edited from only one account until he felt the need to protest his outdated restriction by kicking against it with Gold Hat. One can only assume that had he not made a fuss, he'd be kept under indefinite restrictions until the heat death of the universe. " - Famously Sharp

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=...oldid=428943100

"FWIW, Arbcom has a secondary mailing list; when a member of the committee is recused from something controversial, the supplemental list is broken out of hibernation, all discussion related to the topic is shunted across to it, and the member in question is temporarily unsubscribed. Arbcom is considerably less corrupt than a lot of people think; if the shit ever does hit the fan, the Arbcom archives are where the subpoenas are gonna be aimed, so it's much more by-the-book than you might believe. There's also the obvious point that if Arbcom were really working as a cabal cooking up deals behind the scenes, we wouldn't have quite so many situations (including this one) where it's impossible to get anyone to agree on anything. The Arbcom mailing list isn't so much "stitching up backroom deals", but more "OK, whose turn is it to reply to [insert crank-of-the-day] this time?".

"WRT this particular case, I'm coming round to the view that the right way to stop Jack being singled out for special treatment is to keep the one-account-without-good-reason-to-do-otherwise restriction on Jack, but to spread that ruling out project-wide, even if it means sending Zilla and Catherine into retirement. The time sucked up by endless "is this account legitimate, is that account legitimate?" threads must add up to an impressive figure by now; a straightforward "no more than two accounts for anyone and they have to be clearly linked" rule for everyone would have saved most of this time." – iridescent

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=...oldid=428931720

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:But_you_still_love_me

Another Giano/Bishonen sockpuppet. Probably Giano and friends

No ones gives a shit, so you can stop posting here, now. I can't recall the last time you posted something useful, chrisoff.

BINGO

Take a look at the history of WP:NOT which is one of the most often quoted policies. It was first marked as "policy" back in 2005 without any discussion at all. (or even an edit summary) Most likely because it was already "de facto" policy. Try that today without an RFC and you get raked over the coals.

Really? Cause Jehochman added the joke sockpuppet provision on January 11, 2011 with no discussion, no RFC, and with the edit summary "more" which is not exactly explaining anything.

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=...oldid=405882394

Possibly due to the scarcity of people who distribute a rodent's posterior.

Don't bother, Zoloft. Chrisoff didn't bother listening when I told him five posts ago.

The real problem is not joke alternative accounts but (unintentional) joke real accounts.

(Ah-nex! Ah-nex! Ah-nex!)

If I was a cat, this thread would be a dead moth.

Again, people, Wikipedia policy doesn't mean shit; it's impossible to edit Wikipedia without breaking some policy or another. The purpose of Wikipedia policy is to use it as weapons against people you don't like, by accusing them of violating some rule or another. Doesn't matter if they did, or if the rule you accuse them of violating actually exists, or if the rule has any material relationship to Wikipedia's purpose; all that matter is that you can successfully paint your opponent as being a rulebreaker. Once you've done that, you can sustain any number of odious restrictions on their behavior, on the grounds that they're a "recidivist disruptive influence", and you have won.

The smart Wikipedia gameplayers have figured out this and constantly tinker with the policy documents to create endless rules, exceptions, counterrules, and counterexceptions, in order to turn the formal policy into a tangled mess that makes the rules of Dragon Poker seem straightforward by comparison. Anyone who thinks these policies, especially at this late date, have anything to do with producing an unbiased, neutral, comprehensive encyclopedia is clearly deranged and should be treated as such.

I understand Wikipedia policy better than Dragon Poker, but that's because it's easier to cheat in the Wikipedia game.

This has the makings of a good Wikipedia Review Blog post. What do you say, Kelly? Our blog has been a bit slow lately.

No, I have no idea who [[User:But you still love me]] is. None at all, and they are not that witty either.

Giacomo

ok, sorry! What about User:Ka of Catherine de Burgh? She pops up all over the place and is very opinionated.

Wow, you really are stupid, chrisoff. Why are you so inquisitive?

If this keeps up we'll have a new WR member, Catherine de Burgh's Ghostie, that will be flirting with chrisoff and making atrocious song parodies.

Wow! Where is she? I'm can't wait!