Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Astudent0/Archive

Suspected sockpuppets



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This is either sock or two friends engaging in meatpuppetry to change consensus at AFDs. If you look at the evidences separately, then it won't show much, but collectively they are showing sockpuppetry.

It must be noted that the initial SPI was filed against Astudent0, but Bbb23 asked me to file here. I never had any interaction with Papaursa.


 * User:Astudent0 's Userpage states; I am interested in martial arts and have done amateur MMA. As I enter the real world I expect to have far less time to devote to Wikipedia, so my contributions will probably become much rarer.. This is similar to User:Jakejr's userpage I love martial arts and hate clutter. Wikipedia belief: Any article without an independent source should be automatically removed.


 * User account Astudent0 was created on 15 April 2010. User account Jakejr was created on 17 August 2010


 * Astudent0 has 1,036 edits only on enwiki. Jakejr has 1,300 edits only on enwiki. So for 6 years both of them have made 1000+ edits only on English wikipedia, but not a single edit on other Wikimedia projects.


 * Both with less than 1500 edits have match in 80 AFDs


 * Astudent0 and Jakejr, both have edited Joliet West High School, which is outside the scope of Wikiproject Martial arts and Wikiproject Kickboxing.

My SPI was independent of the previous ones, and I didn't know about this page's existence. This can't be a co-incidence that many different persons came to the same conclusion. I am surprised how he managed to survive this much long time?
 * The behavior was noted by 4 years ago. 1, 2. Completed I have labored over this for days, consulted two Checkusers, other editors previously involved, and have poured over reams of contribs going back a couple of years. It is very, very possible for all three of these to be the same person: Singular focus, the time of day that edits are made line up without conflict, and the number of "coincidences" are too much to ignore, added to the fact that all three edit from the exact same geolocation, even if on different IPs. If I were to be a sockpuppet with the goal of getting away with it, this is a textbook example of how to do it right. But in this case, there is just enough ancillary evidence to show reasonable doubt, so I can't take action at this time. My educated guess is that there is a high likelihood of coordination between the users, perhaps off-wiki, which is a bit beyond the scope of this WP:SPI, but doesn't bar further action by any administrator should they decide to block these users. You might note this decision [10] if they all !vote in a single discussion. This should not be seen as proof that they aren't connected, but rather an inability to definitively connect the accounts at this time, after an exhaustive investigation. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 13:03, 12 June 2012 (UTC) Marvellous Spider -Man  16:49, 27 August 2016 (UTC)


 * Dennis Brown's time analysis Mdtemp seems to edit primarily 15:00 to 22:00 UTC. Papaursa is mainly after 19:00 to 3:00 UTC. Astudent0 edits mainly from 12:00 to 18:00 UTC. I don't want to say this looks like school, home and work, but it could be school, home and work. That would explain the different ISPs. This is still ducky to me, would have to test overlaps a bit to call it. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 00:18, 9 June 2012 (UTC) Marvellous Spider -Man 16:53, 27 August 2016 (UTC)


 * More behavioral evidence after check user's comments


 * Papaursa and Astudent0 intersects in 558 pages including 521 AFDs and 1 deletion review. Astudent has 1038 edits and more than half of his edits was to support Papaursa in AFD nominations. Dennis Brown commented in 2012 in the archives, that they geolocate to the same city.


 * Like Astudent0 and Jakejr, Papaursa and Mdtemp have no edits outside English Wikipedia.
 * I suspect that there are many editors who have only edited the English WP and that it would make for a large SPI if they were all included in this discussion. Papaursa (talk) 00:22, 3 September 2016 (UTC)


 * Editors with shared interests


 * PRehse and Paparuasa's point is that they are editors with shared interests, or editors who focus narrowly on martial arts. Their intersect combo is negligible for mainspace articles, while they intersect heavily on AFDs. This is a peculiar case, when  "editors with shared interests" won't intersect largely in "mainspace martial arts" articles, but they intersect mostly in AFDs.


 * More evidence to connect them


 * Papaursa's first edited on 9th October 2009 His account was created on 9 October 2009 and within minutes after account creation, he voted in AFD.


 * Astudent0 starts editing from 15 April 2010 His account was created on 15 April 2010. He like others voted in AFDs within minutes after account creation.


 * Jakejr starts editing from 17th August 2010 His account was created 17 August 2010. This user also reached an AFd page within minutes after after account creation.


 * Mdtemp shows similar edits from his first edits Now Mdtemp is the newest of these group and see he doesn't even edit AFD, he creates an AFD page on his first day. His account was created on 7 October 2011, and he created this AFD page on 7 October 2011, and please also check how many minutes after account creation

What is the logic behind three different users begin their editing from AFDs, witthin minutes after account creation? Marvellous Spider -Man 15:01, 30 August 2016 (UTC)


 * It's a stretch to claim that any of these editors, especially myself, only edits AfDs. The edit count records tell a different story, especially when you consider that deleted edits are edits of articles that were deleted.  It's also true that not all edits are the same, so they make a poor metric.  I, for one, try to combine my postings into long edits while others would make many posts for the same additions.  I'll bet Spider-Man has lots of posts for his accusations, while I now have made 3 in my defense. Papaursa (talk) 00:04, 1 September 2016 (UTC)
 * It's not about just about editing AFDs, it's about four editors, who reached AFD pages within minutes after they created an account. -- Marvellous Spider -Man 02:05, 7 September 2016 (UTC)
 * I suspect most editors don't create an account until they're ready to edit. Papaursa (talk) 04:37, 9 September 2016 (UTC)


 * I can only speak for myself, but I started with AfDs because it required much less effort than writing an article from scratch. All I really had to know to start was WP:N and WP:RS.  In addition, I didn't really have any articles I wanted to write.  However, there was plenty of clean-up needed, especially in the martial arts articles.  Over five decades of being a martial artist has taught me there's a lot of unsubstantiated claims in the field. Papaursa (talk) 00:04, 1 September 2016 (UTC)


 * Manual nomination in AFD

Papaursa, Astudent0 and Jakejr; (all three) and Mdtemp - don't use WP:Twinkle to nominate articles for deletion. In spite of being here for years they don't like the automated tools as Twinkle for WP:AFD. All of them like to do nominate articles for WP:AFD manually, when these tools were made to make nominating easier.


 * Papaursa


 * Astudent0


 * Jakejr


 * Mdtemp <b style="color:Aqua">Marvellous</b> <b style="color:LawnGreen">Spider</b> -Man 12:48, 5 September 2016 (UTC)
 * You should sign your posts. This argument might have more merit if it encompassed more AfDs.  In the past 2.5 years, Astudent0 has nominated exactly 1 article for deletion, while I have done 17 (about 1 every 2 months).  This isn't exactly a tidal wave of deletions.  I'm also confused by the fact that here you claim they're experienced editors but in another part of this discussion you claim they've made few edits.  You can't have it both ways. Papaursa (talk) 00:22, 3 September 2016 (UTC)
 * I will find similarities between accounts and list them. Few edits for a six year old accounts. Experienced means six years in Wikipedia. No one of this group used twinkle after crossing 500 edits on Wikipedia. <b style="color:Aqua">Marvellous</b> <b style="color:LawnGreen">Spider</b> -Man 12:24, 4 September 2016 (UTC)
 * In an attempt to preserve my good pseudonym, I dispute the supposition that editors with 500 WP edits all use Twinkle. WP:Twinkle says that Twinkle will not work on Windows 7, Vista, XP, and other versions of Microsoft OS.  According to this 2015 data, these systems account for about 80% of all computers.  While it is possible to upgrade the browser to have Twinkle work with the aforementioned OS, it seems unlikely that users who are using old, even unsupported, versions of the OS are likely to upgrade their browsers unless they have to. Papaursa (talk) 05:35, 14 September 2016 (UTC)


 * I think it's more important to look at the what was said. I've already shown there was little overlap between myself and the other editors named.  As for Mdtemp, I won't dispute there's a lot of overlap--although he edits many sports AfDs and I don't (excluding martial arts, of course).  You should also be able to observe a difference in writing style that is quite significant.  Finally,  I think you'll appreciate this interesting detail.  I spent some time looking at the AfD discussions started by all of the editors you've accused and I found that, while I always tagged my AfD discussions with the martial arts WikiProject label and added it to WikiProject Deletion sorting/Martial arts, they virtually never did. Papaursa (talk) 04:37, 9 September 2016 (UTC)


 * Not notifying the page creator about AFD


 * Jakejr finds it inappropriate to notify the page creator about deletion discussion. It's strange that nobody warned him about this. He has created 162 AFD pages manually but maximum times(excluding the prod template) never notified the article creator on their talk page


 * Astudent0 has created 25 AFD pages. And most of the times, he doesn't notify the article creator about the AFD discussion.


 * Mdtemp has created 444 WP:AFD pages manually. He has 65 edits on User talk pages which includes 32 on his own talk page, 18 edits on PRehse's talk page, 2 edits on GorillaWarfare's talk page. So it can be easily concluded that like jakejr and Astudent0, even Mdtemp don't notify the page creator about AFd discussion.


 * Papaursa has created 312 AFD pages. He has 335 edits on user talk pages( out of which 117 edits are on his talk page and 25 on PRehse's talk page). I didn't check in detail, but it can be easily concluded that even Papaursa don't notify the page creator about AFD discussion on the talk page of article creators. -- <b style="color:Aqua">Marvellous</b> <b style="color:LawnGreen">Spider</b> -Man 09:39, 7 September 2016 (UTC)

99% of wikipedians who nominate articles at WP:AFD notify the page creator.
 * Nice stat. Do you have any supporting evidence?  As I told you before, notifying the article creator is not a requirement. Papaursa (talk) 04:37, 9 September 2016 (UTC)

Comments by other users
''Accused parties may also comment/discuss in this section below. See Defending yourself against claims.''
 * Background

Sockpuppet_investigations/Papaursa/Archive Editors suspect that are socks of

Sockpuppet_investigations/Papaursa/Archive After five months, it's suspected that are socks of Papaaursa.

Yesterday I was confirmed that User:Jakerjr and User:Astudent are the same user. Now I found this behavioral similarity independently without any prior knowledge of the previous SPIs.

please, if you can take some quick action here with Jakerj and Astudent0 as your likely CU result plus the evidence given by me along with this SPI's history since 2012 is enough. <b style="color:Aqua">Marvellous</b> <b style="color:LawnGreen">Spider</b> -Man 16:25, 28 August 2016 (UTC)

I have no idea if User:Jakerjr and User:Astudent are the same person but I doubt it, CU certainly has confirmed nothing of the sort. They both like commenting on martial arts AfDs (that's not unique) but the only pattern I see is that both are absent for periods followed by activity and on a few occasions they overlap. Both overlap with me more than they overlap with each other which again only points to a shared interest. They do agree with each other when they do overlap but their arguments tend to be simple policy based arguments and most of the AfDs they are involved in are pretty obvious. I expect whoever deals with this will read the archived comments which again cast as much bit of doubt on their being identical as they do suggest a connection. Writing style certainly appears to be different.Peter Rehse (talk) 11:43, 29 August 2016 (UTC)
 * This has many other issues than simple overlap. You have 80,000+ edits and overlap is not very surprising. They have below 1500 edits. I am busy with RL issues. I will dig further after few days. Last time CU results were not so close.


 * Request to clerk

Please separate this SPI from the SPI page of. I filed the initial SPI against and   only,  asked me to open SPI here as some old archives were showing. '''I had no interaction with. My original SPI was to prove that was socking with  account. And that suspicion is confirmed with CU result.'''

Papaursa is a different editor, but WP:MEAT can be possible, due to past investigations.


 * Frankly, I'm very tired of editors who dislike the results of an AfD discussion deciding to accuse others of sockpuppeting. That's especially true when they don't have the guts to bring this to my attention--but are willing to attack an editor for not notifying him of an AfD discussion.  This is far from my first time and I'm still waiting for evidence.  I looked at the editor interaction between Astudent0 and Jakejr and they have 85 in common--I don't think that's so many for editors who focus on the relatively narrow field of martial arts and each have over 1000 edits.  The CU result does not confirm they are sockpuppets since then the result would have been "confirmed".  The innuendos at WikiProject Deletion sorting/Martial arts are unsupported.  Jakejr was not even a part of the SPI the Marvellous Spider-Man quoted.  The fact that two editors interested in martial arts started editing four months apart is hardly a smoking gun--it seems more like grasping at straws for proof.  Spider-Man says that I and Astudent0 are co-located, which means Jakejr and I should also be co-located if he's right about them being sockpuppets.  However, there was never any evidence Jakejr and I were co-located.  Whatever the closing admin does is up to him/her, but I don't see a burden of proof standard being met (not that that's necessary). Papaursa (talk) 04:08, 30 August 2016 (UTC)
 * Jakejr was very much part of this SPI Sockpuppet_investigations/Papaursa/Archive. <b style="color:Aqua">Marvellous</b> <b style="color:LawnGreen">Spider</b> -Man 04:15, 30 August 2016 (UTC)
 * But he was not part of the SPI where you've posted long quotes from Dennis Brown. That's just an attempt by you to mislead this discussion.  As I've said before, I've been parts of SPIs with lots of editors. Papaursa (talk) 04:23, 30 August 2016 (UTC)

Check users and administrators have more experience. I have given the links before the quote. They won't get misguided. <b style="color:Aqua">Marvellous</b> <b style="color:LawnGreen">Spider</b> -Man 04:26, 30 August 2016 (UTC)
 * I see you haven't let the "Unlikely" result below deter you from posting more comments and innuendos.

WikiProject Deletion sorting/Martial arts/archive will show the overwhelming number of delete results. If you blindly voted delete on every martial arts article, you'd be marked wrong only about 10% of the time. I didn't, but if you check the overlap between PRehse and myself I suspect you'll see a lot of overlap and matching votes and you can look at his SPI to see how that discussion went. Most of the SPIs I've been involved with were started by editors since banned for sockpuppeting and I've learned that deletionism makes you a big target on WP. I keep editing less and less and taking more and more breaks because I'm tired of all the flak I take for trying to be conscientious. I learned a long time ago that what other editors do is out of my hands, so I edit from home and try to leave the histrionics to others. Papaursa (talk) 00:04, 1 September 2016 (UTC)
 * If these editors are my sock or meat puppets, then shouldn't we agree on all our AfD votes? We don't.  It's true there's a lot of delete votes that agree, but any frequent martial arts AfD editor will show that because there's so much dross in martial arts claims.  A look at
 * In response to all the minutiae mentioned by Spider-Man, I thought it might be good to look at the big picture. First, he claims Astudent0 and I are sockpuppets because an earlier SPI stated we were close geographically.  I don't know what the latest CU found, but if it showed we're no longer close geographically it would mean we can't be the same person--especially since I haven't moved in nearly 40 years.  I also looked at the editor interaction between the three of us.  I have edited around 4000 unique articles, but overlap with Astudent0 and Jakejr on about 50--and that includes project pages for martial arts, MMA, sports, my talk page, etc.  That's slightly more than 1%--an amount I would claim is quite small for people focused on the same project.  I'll finish with a quote from Mkdw at a previous SPI involving these editors--"Further, I've seen these editors disagree with one another on certain AFDs which brings a strong argument that they're independent editors." Papaursa (talk) 00:22, 3 September 2016 (UTC)

Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments
The following accounts are to each other:
 * However, they are technically to Papaursa. <b style="color:#151B54">Mike V</b> • <b style="color:#C16C16">Talk</b> 17:11, 27 August 2016 (UTC)
 * However, they are technically to Papaursa. <b style="color:#151B54">Mike V</b> • <b style="color:#C16C16">Talk</b> 17:11, 27 August 2016 (UTC)
 * However, they are technically to Papaursa. <b style="color:#151B54">Mike V</b> • <b style="color:#C16C16">Talk</b> 17:11, 27 August 2016 (UTC)


 * Given that I "forced" to file his report here, please make a determination if Astudent0 should have their own case. Thanks.--Bbb23 (talk) 00:30, 28 August 2016 (UTC)

On behavioural evidence Astudent0, Mdtemp, and Mdtemp Jakejr seem to be unambiguously the same person, and the "Likely" CheckUser result for two of them supports that too, so I have blocked those three accounts. The behavioural evidence for Papaursa also seems to me very convincing, but I have to take into account the negative CheckUser result. Bbb23 and I have more than once in the past disagreed about the significance of CU data. Broadly speaking, Bbb23 tends, it seems to me, to regard CU data a pretty conclusive, and is sometimes willing to let it over-rule significant behavioural evidence, whereas I tend to attach more weight to the idea that : that is to say that I regard CU data as just one of the many pieces of evidence we have available, not necessarily to be always given more weight than any one other piece of evidence. Nevertheless, since there is a negative CU result to be considered, I am not at present blocking Papaursa, and will wait and see whether anyone else has anything to say about it.

I have read the various comments from Papaursa suggesting differences between his/her editing and that of the other accounts, and I do not find any of them convincing. For example, consider the statement that the pages where there is an overlap constitute a small proportion of Papaursa's total editing. However, that is a common situation with sockpuppeteers: one uses multiple accounts on the same page only when one feels a need to, because, for example, one fears that a discussion will go against one's views, and most of the time one uses only one account. Then we have various statements which use the argument that the overlap in editing is entirely explained by common interests. However, while common interests might explain why several accounts edit pages on the same topic, the similarity goes much further than just editing on the same topic: there are numerous other similarities. For example, all the accounts edit to an amazing extent AfD discussions more than everything else put together, more of a concentration in that one area than I can ever remember seeing from one editor before in all my years on Wikipedia, and here we have not one but four editors with this singular specialisation in AfDs, and they also have numerous other similarities, such as all specialising in martial arts. There are also similarities in the way they comment in those discussions, and so on. We have the statement "I've seen these editors disagree with one another on certain AFDs which brings a strong argument that they're independent editors": no, it brings only a weak argument that they're independent editors, because anyone with any significant experience of sockpuppet investigations will know that having one's sockpuppets sometimes disagree with one another is one of the commonest tricks used to throw suspicion off one's sockpuppetry, especially in cases where, as here, an editor has in the past been repeatedly suspected of sockpuppetry.

In the few cases where the editors edits something other than a martial arts AfD, they pick the same page to edit more often than one might expect from chance. For example, Papaursa and Astudent0 both edited the article Seidō juku. What is more, out of all the years they have been editing, they both edited that page within two days of one another. Yes, that is in the area of interest which they both share, but for two editors whose editing is so heavily concentrated on AfDs to both have one of their infrequent article edits within a couple of days of one another, and both happen to choose the same one out of the hundreds of martial arts articles they could have chosen is a striking coincidence. Not a big enough coincidence to prove anything on its own, but it's just one more of numerous coincidences that all add up.

To me, apart from things which have already been said above, a very striking thing is Papaursa's comment beginning "I don't know what the latest CU found, but if it showed we're no longer close geographically it would mean we can't be the same person". Why should he or she have any reason to think that the geographic location of the other accounts has changed? If he/she knows nothing about the other accounts, then it is difficult to see why he/she would come up with that. If, however, he/she knows all about the other accounts and where their editing geolocates to, and knows full well that it is somewhere different from where the Papaursa account geolocates to, then that is exactly the sort of thing he/she might bring up.

As I said above, the behavioural evidence strongly suggests to me that Papaursa is the same person as the other accounts. I have briefly indicated some of the reasons why I find his/her defence statements unconvincing. I cannot completely dismiss the negative CheckUser results, but they don't prove anything, as there are numerous ways that one editor can arrange for different accounts to show up as unrelated to a CheckUser. We should also bear in mind that Papaursa knows that an earlier CheckUser showed a geographical connection to the other accounts, and therefore would have a reason for finding ways to make such a connection invisible. I would be pleased if one or more other administrators would comment on how convincing they find the behavioural evidence.

My final comment is that it is now almost seven weeks since Bbb23's CheckUser report, and the fact that in that much time no administrator has seen fit to close the case as "no sockpuppetry" does suggest that I may not be the only one who thinks that the negative CU report does not settle the matter. The editor who uses the pseudonym "JamesBWatson" (talk) 12:45, 13 October 2016 (UTC)


 * Not an administrator but I guess I fall under anyone else. I already stated that I don't think  or  are the same but it is hard to argue against that convincingly on behavior grounds considering the CU result so maybe.  I could not find a CU result connecting  with those two but it may be buried in there somewhere.  What really bothers me is  the implied connection to  which is really a stretch and if true is one of the most amazing and baffling cases ever considering the number of years this has, allegedly, been going on.  The cited behavioral evidence is so broad it could include myself and others with the same brush and for that I protest.  I was assuming that the reason it was taking this so long to close is that the reams of cited evidence was so weak.Peter Rehse (talk) 14:00, 13 October 2016 (UTC)
 * No checkuser was done on Mdtemp during this SPI because he was added after the CU was done. As for my comment about Astudent's location, that was based on his comment on his talk page during a previous SPI discussion.  That comment is still there, but I'm sure Mr. Watson would claim that's not convincing since I was just using my computer wizardly skills like I did to fool the CU.  It's interesting that I didn't use this technique during the earlier SPI when we were determined to be co-located.  I'm still not sure exactly what that means on WP as opposed to the real world since it found different ISPs being used which means it wasn't happening from my home computer (which is the only place I edit WP from). This discussion claims I don't have computer skills based on the AfD creations and that I do based on the CU results.  I'm fairly convinced that whatever I say and do will be taken as evidence I'm guilty. Papaursa (talk) 21:08, 14 October 2016 (UTC)
 * I think meant "Astudent0, Mdtemp, and Jakejr ". In his statement he alludes to a CU only tying two of the accounts together, that being Astudent0 and Jakejr. I suspect Mdtemp was blocked because of behavioural evidence. Some of it is highly dubious, but other evidence submitted cannot be ignored. I'm also of the opinion that the evidence against Papaursa is highly circumstantial. Marking this case as closed.  Mkdw talk 22:56, 16 October 2016 (UTC)
 * Yes, I did mean "Astudent0, Mdtemp, and Jakejr ". Thanks for pointing out my mistake. The editor who uses the pseudonym "JamesBWatson" (talk) 12:36, 18 October 2016 (UTC)


 * Note to clerks I think this case should be moved to the oldest blocked account. No admin, clerk, or CU has concluded or taken action against for sock puppetry. SPI operates under the presumption of innocence and the blocks implemented against the other editors should be filed under the appropriate sock master and not archived under Papaursa's username.  Mkdw talk 23:02, 16 October 2016 (UTC)

I've been looking into this independently and poring over editing statistics all afternoon, and I find myself coming to the same conclusions as. What's especially striking to me is that all four of these accounts (Papaursa, Astudent0, Jakejr and Mdtemp, to be clear) not only share a focus on martial arts as Papaursa has suggested, they share a focus on martial arts deletion. Here's what I mean:
 * Papaursa was created 9 October 2009, their first two edits were to AfD.
 * Astudent0 was created 15 April 2010, their second edit was to an AfD. Only edited Wikipedia: space between March 2012 and September 2015 (3 years 6 months), except for a handful of edits to user talk pages.
 * Jakejr was created 16 August 2010 at 21:40, created a userpage at 21:42 and then between 21:46 and 21:48 made comments on 3 AfDs. Did not edit mainspace at all until December, except to nominate articles for deletion.
 * Mdtemp was created 7 October 2011, their first two edits were an AfD nomination (AfD page and AfD log, and presumably AfD notice on the article although I can't see it). Didn't edit mainspace until the following January.
 * The notion that these four are focused on martial arts deletion is backed up by their proportion of edits to project space, and to AfDs in particular:
 * Papaursa (68% Wikipedia to 16.6% article, 1963 AfDs edited out of 2917 unique pages [67.3%])
 * Astudent0 (86.7% to 6.4%, 653 out of 743 [87.9%])
 * Jakejr (81.1% to 13.2%, 500 out of 681 [73.4%])
 * Mdtemp (84.9% to 7.3%, 1421 out of 1770 [80.3%]);
 * compared with several editors I plucked somewhat randomly from the other top contributors at the martial arts delsort page, editors active at WikiProject Martial Arts, and other editors mentioned in SPIs related to these four accounts:
 * (7.6% to 48.8%, 1747 out of 38440 [4.5%])
 * (18.9% to 32.8%, 443 out of 4628 [9.6%])
 * (38.7% to 19.8%, 1995 out of 7396 [27.0%])
 * (8.1% to 60.7%, 320 out of 5145 [6.2%])
 * (18.2% to 58.8%, 73 out of 916 [8.0%]);
 * and just for the hell of it:
 * myself (44.2% to 31.3%, 284 out of 4912 [5.8%]).
 * Here are the conclusions I draw from this, and which we know from other analysis:
 * these four editors edit project-space far more than article-space, as compared to editors with similar interests;
 * these four editors edit AfDs as a very large proportion of their total contributions, as compared to other editors;
 * technical data shows that these four editors are physically located near each other, and/or have been in the past.
 * My opinion is that Papaursa = Astudent0 = Jakejr = Mdtemp. I should say here that I started into this with the notion that this sort of data would demonstrate that Papaursa was definitively not related, but we make declarations of sockpuppetry on much weaker behavioural evidence than this. Given the length of this, possibly conflicting CU data and the number of more experienced users who have already commented on this at different times, I am placing this pending further comment. Ivanvector (Talk/Edits) 21:14, 17 October 2016 (UTC)
 * Pinging some of the above-mentioned "users who have already commented": Ivanvector (Talk/Edits) 21:23, 17 October 2016 (UTC)


 * I stand behind my original comments and analysis some 4 years ago, and nothing has really changed in my mind. Back then, I did a lot of mediating in MMA topics.  I was newish to SPI (although not to investigation), and tended to over-investigate if anything, so I trust my reasoning as given.  I haven't looked at evidence since then, but at that time, I was truly 50/50, on the fence and sat on the decision for some time, debating, looking, comparing.  I didn't block because I couldn't quite "prove" it, although I was more convinced than not.  There are some logical reasons for some of the connections, but the sheer number of coincidences and similarities defy reasoning. I would prefer an outside admin take a look and decide here, and suggest this case remain open until one does a full investigation of behavior. Dennis Brown - 2&cent; 21:52, 17 October 2016 (UTC)


 * In the archive, another user suggested the overlap in AfD stats is because the users participated in the WikiProject Martial arts/Article Review. But that argument doesn't hold up: the review page was only edited between 18 Feb and 23 July 2010, and of this group only Papaursa edited the page at all; two of the four accounts were created later than the last time that page was edited. To evaluate the argument, I performed the same analysis on other accounts that did participate in that review:
 * (8.1% to 60.7%, 320 out of 5145 [6.2%]) (already included above)
 * (10.1% to 63.2%, 163 out of 2645 [6.2%])
 * (2.6% to 84.3%, 218 out of 4743 [4.6%])
 * (17.3% to 54.1%, 2336 out of 7301 [32.0%])
 * Just adding this to the evidence that these four accounts are the same user: we now have geolocation match, at least one "likely" CheckUser result between some of the accounts (but "unlikely" for others), and editing pattern showing a singular focus on project space (and deletion in particular) in an already narrow subject field, while other users in that field and in general devote a much higher proportion of their edits to articles. To me, all of this evidence together shows a connection that is not adequately explained by any of the rationalizations that have been offered. However, I respect the opinions of the many other users who have commented on this, and so I am declining to request action and close this myself. I will be posting at WP:AN to invite fresh eyes to take a look at this, as I agree with that this should not be archived under Papaursa if more users disagree with my conclusion. Ivanvector (Talk/Edits) 16:33, 20 October 2016 (UTC)


 * Unrelated to Ivan's work, but back then when I made the original assessment, meatpuppetry (and other forms of disruption) was a major concern in the entire MMA area, enough so that the community authorized General Sanctions . Almost no one was sanctioned under it, as the threat alone settled the area down, but MMA was a mess of socks, meat, edit warring, AFD warring, etc. back then.  Admin wouldn't even touch ANI filings. I just wanted to paint a picture for those not familiar.  Dennis Brown - 2&cent; 21:54, 20 October 2016 (UTC)


 * I hope this is the last time I need to comment on this. When I went on one of my increasingly frequent WP breaks, this discussion was marked as "closed" by Mkdw with a recommendation of no action against me.  I come back to find Ivanvector's data reputedly showing my sockpuppetry.  As I said months ago in this discussion, edit counts are not a good metric.  Assuming all article edits are equivalent is just wrong--removing a comma from 500 articles is not the same as adding 500 characters to one article.  I commented before about the length of my edits, but I thought I'd do a quick check.  I decided to look at my last 1000 remaining edits and consider only those that were to actual articles.  I then looked at the average change in length of those articles for each edit (positive or negative made no difference).  I found that number to be 645.  When I gathered the same data for a like number of PRehse's article edits (chosen because he's a frequent martial arts editor and mentioned by Ivanvector), I got a value of 104.  That means if I made my edits the same length as his, I'd have made over 6 times as many article edits.  Apparently I'm being penalized for not hitting save every few characters.  This data also ignores the fact that, according to X! tools data, over 60% of my article edits have been deleted.  That's not surprising when you consider that fact that I often use AfD nominations as a starting point for editing.  Those are clearly articles in need of work, especially with martial arts articles, but it doesn't help my stats.


 * If we look at the facts, I think it's hard to make the case for sockpuppetry.
 * 1. CU data shows us as being "unlikely".
 * 2. It's been pointed out in multiple SPIs that the writing styles are quite different.
 * 3. If we look at the AfD stats for the last 1000 AfD votes, which is supposedly the biggest indicator of sockpuppetry, we see that I vote to keep articles 2-3 times more often than Prehse or Mdtemp and that they are 30-35 times more likely to have an AfD discussion where they've voted "Delete" to be closed as "Keep" than I am. Although it would be ludicrous to suggest Prehse and Mdtemp are sockpuppets, their AfD voting records are much more similar to each other than they are to mine. Papaursa (talk) 11:04, 5 November 2016 (UTC)


 * After reading through this whole SPI and the archive, I can only come to these conclusions:
 * Astudent0, Jakejr and Mdtemp are the same editor (and are already for it); Astudent0 being the oldest account
 * Papaursa could be the same user, and there is both a lot of evidence demonstrating that connection and evidence demonstrating the opposite. Those who are convinced Papaursa is the master of the other three named accounts will probably never be able to shake that feeling, but as Dennis said, it's near-impossible to prove beyond reasonable doubt, and as such, it wouldn't be completely fair to block for that. There's also the fact MMA topics have a colorful history of SPAs, socks and meatpuppets and Papaursa's involvement in the topic area might be tainting the perspective of those scrutinizing the account, expecting to find sockpuppetry. For this reason, I am closing without action w/r/t to Papaursa
 * The question is then, where to archive? Papaursa being determined as "not demonstrably related" means we would normally archive the case under the older of the proven socks. However, I feel like these allegations against Papaursa are bound to resurface in the future and I feel like this report's content remains invaluable for anyone trying to gain insight into the whole situation. So I will take an exceptional step (WP:IAR) of moving the report and archiving it under Sockpuppet investigations/Astudent0 (and tagging as such), but also committing an "empty" case to Papaursa's archive pointing towards the Astudent0's SPI archive for future reference. ☺ ·  Salvidrim!   ·  &#9993;  17:07, 7 November 2016 (UTC)