Hello,
First of all I was asked to take a look at the following case. I found it very
strange how people behave against other people and I would like to write about
it and ask opinions. I'm sure this is not only for this user but there are more
users like this.
I understand that its needed for people to block users when the encyclopedia or
the project is in danger, but where do will place the border? I think
destroying people or behaving against people like I will describe below is also
endangering the project. We should all remember that we are humans and not
robots and everybody makes mistakes. Therefor I am sure that there was behavior
that was totally wrong, but the way the whole international community decided
to handle it was wrong also.
First of all we have a policy against socks. In that policy we describe that
its not right to edit with two accounts at the same time or working together
with 2 accounts to get something done. Secondly its not right to use new
accounts to evade blocks. Lastly bot accounts are not seen as socks neither are
old and unused accounts. Besides that we have a policy in place that says that
people are free to leave the project or abandon a username and continue with a
new name. This I guess is for protecting the project and protecting the people
that work on it.
Now to get to my case. On 3 July on Meta a attack started against a former
Dutch Wikipedia user. This attack was mainly started by people of the Dutch
Wikipedia. The same people that are willing to destroy this user.
(http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_comment/Abigor) now before you all
click away this message hear me out and give me opinions. This is now almost
two years ago and a good moment to look back. If I am wrong please point me to
that and lets keep a good talk instead of going all "don't waste our time".
In this case there was a big list of names that where socks and this
"sockmaster" needed to be blocked. But when we look at our policies and on that
list we see the following:
Abigor (talk • contribs • block • SULinfo • x-wiki • CA) - thats meAbiBot (talk
• contribs • block • SULinfo • x-wiki • CA) No sock its a bot, only did bot
editsAbiBot.nl.wiki (talk • contribs • block • SULinfo • x-wiki • CA) No sock
its a bot, only did bot editsAbibot (talk • contribs • block • SULinfo • x-wiki
• CA) (renamed to AbiBot[2], self acknowledged)Huib (talk • contribs • block •
SULinfo • x-wiki • CA) Created on request by meta communety en en.wiki
communety, because I sign with Huib while I'm abigor... Its points to my abigor
account and its created to protect my own account. Execpt for the rename edits,
it didn't edit at all.Huib (old) (talk • contribs • block • SULinfo • x-wiki •
CA) Did a rename request to get Huib free..Sterkebak (talk • contribs • block •
SULinfo • x-wiki • CA) old account... on my userpage is a note that I used to
use that oneSterkeBak (talk • contribs • block • SULinfo • x-wiki • CA) old
account... on my userpage is a note that I used to use that oneSterkebot (talk
• contribs • block • SULinfo • x-wiki • CA) No sock its a bot, only did bot
editsSterkeBot (talk • contribs • block • SULinfo • x-wiki • CA) (renamed from
Sterkebot[3][4] and later renamed to AbiBot[5][6])P.J.L Laurens (talk •
contribs • block • SULinfo • x-wiki • CA) - Its a account created for my
uploads, it has a different userpage on Commons with information about me as
photographer. Didn't do any edits just created for the userpage and
information. All my uploads are pointed to this one with a link.WikiLinkBot
(talk • contribs • block • SULinfo • x-wiki • CA) No sock its a bot. Only
editted on nl.wiki to let its userpage be removed, the dutch admins didn't want
to remove the page.This list is ctrl C Ctrl V from Meta.
Now go to the policy:
Abigor is the account of the user. Than we have AbiBot, AbiBot.nl.Wiki and
Abibot sterkebot SterkeBot as bot accounts. According to the policy accounts
used by a bot without human edits are not socks. Huib and Huib (old) Sterkbak
SterkeBak P.J.L Laurens. All those names are old accounts without overlapping
edits so according to the policy its not socking. Some accounts doesn't have
edits at all but where only there to redirect. WikiLinkBot is intresting cause
its now in use by a other user. This user is also the source for the blocking
on the Dutch Wikipedia. Abigor would have placed personal attacks against this
user and now the user is having that accounts. Very intresting don't you think.
Then we get a bunch of accounts:
Accounts with only a few edits and no CU results where linked to this users. I
strongly believe that we should have proof before pointing something out and
say "hey it was you". But the account where I want to speak about is Delay. We
have the policy that says that you can start right over with a new account. But
still a Foundation employee confirms a link between the Delay Account and the
Abigor account something CU didn't do at start. So we have a policy, but the
policy doesn't work for some people?
The coolest thing here is that we block him for disrupting a project. Or
disrupting multiple projects, but every account used on the Wikipedia did get a
barnstar for good work. Since when do we give vandals barnstars? Or since when
do we block people doing good work?
So in this case one of the accounts that pointed to him is now in use by the
user requesting Abigor to get blocked. There are a bunch of account creations
that are never clearly linked to the user. Its linked by Abigor was on
Wikimania so he have done the actions. And after that we decided to TELL all
communities where he was active that he is a danger.
So tell me, why doesn't get this user the change to start over like many others
did. Many people have more accounts, or old accounts and why don't do they get
blocked and most off all why do we keep hunting him down when there is clear
proof that he is doing good work (a.k.a barnstars). Where do we draw the line
between protecting a community or scaring people off?
Ed
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