Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Fanoftheworld/Archive

Evidence submitted by SarekOfVulcan
New account making similar edits to indef-blocked user. Account name implies that this is a returning editor. --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 14:23, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

Comments by accused parties
See Defending yourself against claims.

Clerk, patrolling admin and checkuser comments
Quack quack, Mr. Ducksworth! Bagged and tagged. TN X Man 19:57, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

31 August 2011

 * Suspected sockpuppets


 * User compare report Auto-generated every hour.

I believe that this user is a sockpuppet of blocked editor user:Fanoftheworld. Both users are WP:SPA editors dedicated to promoting Steinway & Sons and exhibiting WP:OWN over that article. Fanoftheworld was blocked March 26, 2010; and Peoplefromarizona became active not too long afterward, July 2, 2010. and almost immediately began editing exclusively Steinway-related articles, and even getting into same types of hot disputes with the same editors.

I am not the first to notice the resemblance; see,. TJRC (talk) 23:35, 31 August 2011 (UTC)

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

Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments

 * The master is far too stale to run a checkuser. However, I've blocked and tagged Peoplefromarizona as a sock of the master based on behavioral evidence. —  Hello Annyong  (say whaaat?!) 00:40, 1 September 2011 (UTC)

01 September 2011

 * Suspected sockpuppets




 * User compare report Auto-generated every hour.

Rerumirf showed up 8 days after Fanoftheworld was blocked. Both editors share an interest in Freemasonry, Steinway, and Danish politicians; an unusual combination. Note that the user's name is Freemason in Danish, turned backwards. Both frequently use the Help desk and Village pump for advice. Binksternet (talk) 01:05, 1 September 2011 (UTC)

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

Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments

 * That account hasn't edited in months. We can leave it alone for now. —  Hello Annyong  (say whaaat?!) 01:08, 1 September 2011 (UTC)

27 September 2011

 * Suspected sockpuppets




 * User compare report Auto-generated every hour.

RexBiede has reverted a paragraph about Steinway & Sons being owned by Steinway Musical Instruments, the paragraph briefly discussing SMI's composition, specifically the majority shareholder Samick. A recently blocked sockpuppet of Fanoftheworld—Peoplefromarizona—was also very concerned to remove any mention of Steinway's major stockholder Samick, removing the mention repeatedly. Binksternet (talk) 16:39, 27 September 2011 (UTC) Binksternet (talk) 16:39, 27 September 2011 (UTC)

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

Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments
✅ as being the same:
 * Technically, RexBiede is a match.  TN X Man  18:17, 27 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Blocked and tagged the confirmed sock. I've also blocked RexBiede on behavioral grounds. —  Hello Annyong  (say whaaat?!) 00:16, 28 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Technically, RexBiede is a match.  TN X Man  18:17, 27 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Blocked and tagged the confirmed sock. I've also blocked RexBiede on behavioral grounds. —  Hello Annyong  (say whaaat?!) 00:16, 28 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Technically, RexBiede is a match.  TN X Man  18:17, 27 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Blocked and tagged the confirmed sock. I've also blocked RexBiede on behavioral grounds. —  Hello Annyong  (say whaaat?!) 00:16, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

13 February 2012

 * Suspected sockpuppets




 * User compare report Auto-generated every hour.


 * Same behaviour as with previous incarnations. Most edits are to promote Steinway pianos at the expense of other makes.
 * Most recent bout of disruptive editing consisted of repeated attempts to change the top image in Piano to an image of a Steinway model created in Commons by Fanoftheworld.
 * This edit by, for example, closely resembles this edit by a previous sock . Note in particular the similar edit summaries.
 * Other edits relate largely to Denmark and Danish culture, as with previous socks.
 * The last sock,, was blocked 28 September 2011 and came into existence a few days later on 9 October 2011. Deskford (talk) 03:50, 13 February 2012 (UTC)

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

I agree that JAL78 appears to be Fanoftheworld because of highly promotional Steinway & Sons interest combined with that of Danish politicians and other Danish topics. Binksternet (talk) 04:05, 13 February 2012 (UTC)

Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments

 * Per WP:DUCK I've blocked and tagged the sock. —  Hello Annyong  (say whaaat?!) 04:24, 13 February 2012 (UTC)

08 March 2012

 * Suspected sockpuppets




 * User compare report Auto-generated every hour.

This IP address has been interested solely with Steinway & Sons and related articles such as Steinway Hall. The IP is from Denmark, same as sockpuppeter Fanoftheworld and socks Peoplefromarizona and JAL78, who all were interested in Steinway, Freemasonry and Danish politicians. Today, the IP has been warring to keep a long list of external links that were added by Peoplefromarizona and by Fanoftheworld. The IP appears to be joined by a new sock: Recordingsessions. Binksternet (talk) 15:13, 8 March 2012 (UTC)

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

Personal hunting of users with other opinions is not a good idea as I see it. I've started a discussion on http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Steinway_Hall#External_links but as you see Binksternet is very unconstructive. Btw: Should Wikipedia start blocking all editors from Denmark with other opinions than Binksternet or blocking all other editors in the article Steinway & Sons just because they have other opinions than Binksternet. --195.254.169.226 (talk) 15:23, 8 March 2012 (UTC)

Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments

 * - I duck blocked them. IP is static, let us know if it needs a reblock for longer. -- DQ  (ʞlɐʇ)  15:25, 8 March 2012 (UTC)

14 June 2012

 * Suspected sockpuppets




 * User compare report Auto-generated every hour.

The master account and related socks were blocked across multiple projects, and Oldenergy's global contribs share characteristics of other socks of this user, namely going to every single Wikipedia project and replacing images on Piano articles with Steinway images. - SudoGhost 20:34, 14 June 2012 (UTC)
 * I don't remember how, or even how to check, but the editor was globablly blocked in some way via a discussion on one of the IRC channels. - SudoGhost 22:46, 14 June 2012 (UTC)

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


 * Oldenergy is acting exactly like previous socks in pushing Steinway up and tearing other piano companies down, especially by way of images. This one quacks like a duck. Binksternet (talk) 21:55, 14 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Not sure how to add another when the case is already open, but looks like another duck to me. This new editor's only action has been to reinstate on Steinway D-274 the promotional image that was created by Fanoftheworld on Commons. --Deskford (talk) 22:33, 14 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Oh, hold on, presumably I can just add them above...? --Deskford (talk) 22:42, 14 June 2012 (UTC)


 * I don′t know which ones you′ve already blocked, so I give you alle the names I came across on German Wikipedia: User:Oldenergy, User:Hereiamfriends, User:Recordingsessions, User:JAL78 and User:ANCJensen. This deletion on Commons was their work, too. --BoyBoy (talk) 00:44, 15 June 2012 (UTC)
 * The art of building on previous experience: Fanoftheworld and Hereiamfriends. --BoyBoy (talk) 22:07, 16 June 2012 (UTC)

Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments
OK, this is silly. Everything else is, but the following are ✅ as each other: . WilliamH (talk) 14:03, 18 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Blocked and tagged. Enough evidence exists to match them with previous socks. -- DQ  (ʞlɐʇ)  14:10, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

26 April 2015

 * Suspected sockpuppets




 * User compare report Auto-generated every hour.
 * Editor interaction utility

Result of Check user on Commons. Keen interest in Steinway & Sons article and similar conduct as Fanoftheworld (and huge amount of socks created by Fanoftheworld). Blocked on dawp as a sock puppet. Pugilist (talk) 22:24, 26 April 2015 (UTC)

Comments by other users
''Accused parties may also comment/discuss in this section below. See Defending yourself against claims.'' Looking at the archives, this user can be quickly spotted by an obsession with Steinway & Sons plus has had many previous sock names with long all one word lowercase names, many with repeated words and previous references to "old". here (ex "Goagainagain") and here ("Oldenergy"). This is a behavioral slam dunk, IMHO. Montanabw (talk) 19:23, 28 April 2015 (UTC)
 * Comment by uninvolved Montanabw

Similar style in edit summaries is evident in the use of plus signs: "linkfix + wrong info corrected + typo", "+ Mediator's agreement", "+ typos" (Fanoftheworld); "+ Updated", "adjusting to references + adding cite templates", "Two dead links + out of scope" (Oldnewnew).
 * Comment by Binksternet

Fanoftheworld was observed to have contributed from Denmark. It looks like Oldnewnew also contributes from Denmark, via 130.225.26.238 which preceded Oldnewnew edits by a few minutes on two occasions: first 14:24, January 28, 2015, then 14:27; second 16:39, January 30, 2015 then 16:42. These show that Oldnewnew started a session logged out then he logged in for his second edit. Binksternet (talk) 21:57, 28 April 2015 (UTC)

Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments

 * The CheckUser on commons shows connection between  and . How does that prove the connection to Fanoftheworld?  Vanjagenije   (talk)  19:04, 28 April 2015 (UTC)
 * @ Vanjagenije : From the Commons check user investigation you will see that Fanoftheworld is a suspected related user to Noblepeopleuploader. Fanoftheworld was blocked on Commons on 13 February 2012. The conclusion on Commons could have been more clear in terms of who is connected to who and in terms of whether the two users were actually confirmed to belong to Fanoftheworld, however, the link between Fanoftheworld and Noblepeopleuploader/Oldnewnew was also an issue in the case on Commons. --Pugilist (talk) 11:29, 29 April 2015 (UTC)
 * is blocked on Danish Wikipedia as the sock of, that is Fanoftheworld. He is alos blocked on Commons for using multiple accounts. This should be enough to block him here.  Vanjagenije  (talk)  22:51, 29 April 2015 (UTC)

— Berean Hunter   (talk)  15:29, 30 April 2015 (UTC)
 * Indeffing and closing.

29 January 2016

 * Suspected sockpuppets




 * User compare report Auto-generated every hour.
 * Editor interaction utility

Looks very much the same person who used the username before. Same article as main interest:. First edit was this, clearly not new to Wikipedia or to that specific article. This was shortly after Oldnewnew was blocked. Same way of signing talk page messages. DVdm (talk) 13:38, 29 January 2016 (UTC)

Comments by other users
''Accused parties may also comment/discuss in this section below. See Defending yourself against claims.''
 * I, too, am suspicious of any account that arrives here to work primarily on the Steinway article, however positive the contribution. Here's an interesting diff of a past sock, Peoplefromarizona, asking a question at the Help Desk. The diff shows this person very interested in streamlining the references in the Steinway article, which is what TheReferenceProvider is doing. Note that the asking of questions at the Help Desk is a common activity of this person: Fanoftheworld, Peoplefromarizona, JAL78,"I am NOT good at English." Rerumirf, Moviedk, TheReferenceProvider. I think we have a connection. Binksternet (talk) 03:49, 3 February 2016 (UTC)

Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments
The editor interaction tool (The ReferenceProvider vs. Oldnewnew) shows that TheReferenceProvider and Oldnewnew (the latest blocked sock, see archive) have both edited six articles related to Steinway & Sons and the Steinway family, five of them very obscure BLPs, TheReferenceProvider also went straight to Steinway & Sons, making advanced edits there on their first day of editing. That article was also the last article edited by Oldnewnew, and the page history of the article shows that very few edits were made on it between the end of April, when Oldnewnew was blocked, and the beginning of August, when The ReferenceProvider started editing (the account was created at 9,15UTC on 4 August, just over three months after Oldnewnew was indeffed, and made their first advanced edits just a few minutes later, heading straight for Steinway & Sons). Their gnoming habits are also very similar. Since the latest sock was blocked almost a year ago a CU-check, which would have been merited if Oldnewnew hadn't been stale, isn't possible, but based on behavioural analysis and editor interaction there is IMO enough of a connection between them to block TheReferenceProvider per WP:DUCK. Thomas.W talk 18:04, 8 March 2016 (UTC)
 * Given CU intelligence and behavoir, there is enough to say with certainty that this is the master. Also ✅ . -- Amanda  (aka DQ) 23:24, 11 March 2016 (UTC)

28 April 2016

 * Suspected sockpuppets




 * User compare report Auto-generated every hour.
 * Editor interaction utility

Note that the last sock, User:TheReferenceProvider, edited recently enough to provide a non-stale connection to the master account. Binksternet (talk) 03:43, 28 April 2016 (UTC)

Checkuser requested because this person has used so many socks in the past. Binksternet (talk) 03:59, 28 April 2016 (UTC)


 * Evidence
 * KJHis-JKHB upon his first-ever edit went to the Steinway article and performed advanced work such as adding named refs. Despite the understanding of Wikipedia methods, this editor from Denmark has some trouble with English, as seen in the above-linked diff: "...an Austrian engineer who previously have made"... After a few more edits to the Steinway article, the new account chimed in on the article talk page as if continuing the discussion started by confirmed sock TheReferenceProvider. Like previous socks, this account also edits Steinway topics in other languages. Even when participating in German, the account uses English in some cases. It looks very much like the same person. Binksternet (talk) 03:59, 28 April 2016 (UTC)

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

Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments

 * is ✅ to in the archives. Blocked and tagged.-- Jezebel's Ponyo bons mots  17:50, 28 April 2016 (UTC)

Suspected sockpuppets



 * User compare report Auto-generated every hour.
 * Editor interaction utility

A month after confirmed sock User:KJHis-JKHB was blocked, the account Hofurytg was registered, with all of its edits focused on Steinway & Sons. After just 20 edits, the person reacted to my reversions by calling me a "self-proclaimed policeman" and "self-proclaimed ruler of Wikipedia." The response should have been some confusion and questioning if this had been a new user. Binksternet (talk) 22:17, 1 September 2016 (UTC)
 * Checkuser requested just in case location information can be used to help identify this account's location. Past socks geolocated to Denmark. Binksternet (talk) 22:20, 1 September 2016 (UTC)

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

User:Binksternet has given me a warning on User talk:Hofurytg for me being engaged in an edit war on the Steinway & Sons article against him. However, User:Binksternet himself is being engaged in the edit on the Steinway & Sons article. A person who violates a rule and at the same time gives other editors a warning for violating that particular rule is in my opinion a "self-proclaimed policeman" and "self-proclaimed ruler of Wikipedia". (Double standard).

By the way, when I take a look in the edit history of the Steinway & Sons article I can see that User:Binksternet haven't wrote anything in the article over the years. He looks like a non-contributing editor - and Wikipedia was of course not built by non-contributing editors. And I see that he has accused some of the editors of the Steinway & Sons article of being member of staff in the PR department of the American-German Steinway & Sons company!

Based on his warning on my talk page I have given User:Binksternet a warning on User talk:Binksternet for being engaged in an edit war on the Steinway & Sons article. My guess is that he will delete the warning from his talk page in a couple of days after this sockpuppet investigation has been closed.

How many warnings has User:Binksternet received all in all?? --Hofurytg (talk) 23:17, 1 September 2016 (UTC)


 * The fact that Hofurytg has found this page on his own demonstrates that he's an experienced Wikipedia user, not a new user with a few tens of edits. Binksternet (talk) 00:19, 2 September 2016 (UTC)
 * I made the decision to remove some uncivil comments Hofurytg left here and on their user talk page. It was about Binksternet, and the hostility seemed to come out of nowhere. The unwarranted personal attacks against the editor who has been most active in this SPI over the years only adds to the mounting evidence. Sro23 (talk) 22:47, 5 September 2016 (UTC)
 * "It was about Binksternet, and the hostility seemed to come out of nowhere." - "nowhere"??!!: Binksternet's edit war based on his personal opinions:, , . And Binksternet's personal attack: . --Hofurytg (talk) 04:04, 6 September 2016 (UTC)

Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments

 * . Normally, I wouldn't consider the mere possibility of geolocating someone to Denmark to be enough of a reason to do a CU check — Denmark has almost 6 million residents, after all.  But given this person's lengthy archived history of confirmed socks, I'll approve this one, both for a potential match to the suspected sock, and also for any sleepers that might show up.  —  Rich wales (no relation to Jimbo) 03:56, 3 September 2016 (UTC)
 * Everything is in the archives. That being said, the exact geolocation and ISP to confirmed socks in the archive is a match. . .-- Jezebel's Ponyo bons mots  19:48, 7 September 2016 (UTC)
 * please block . Same obsession with Steinway and with harassing Binksternet, plus the geolocation match. I would not call this CU-confirmed, but it's a WP:DUCK for sure.
 * I am in agreement, the behavioural evidence is very strong. under WP:DUCK. Marking as closed.  Mkdw talk 20:06, 23 September 2016 (UTC)

Suspected sockpuppets



 * Tools: Editor interaction utility • Interaction Timeline • User compare report Auto-generated every hour.

Checkuser is impossible because the old accounts are stale. Fanoftheworld often edited from Aarhus in Denmark, so the IPs will be from that area. After the sock Hofurytg was blocked in September 2016, 193.33.148.24 began editing the page in February 2017. At the time I declared that this was block evasion by Fanoftheworld. 193.33.148.24 was active through June 2017, despite being reverted very often. In August–October 2017, 130.225.26.41 was active. In November, the username EarthInTheUniverse was registered, and the user immediately focused on Steinway topics as well as a few pages related to the piano portal. When editing other piano manufacturers, the edits were small and neutral. When editing Steinway, the net result is to promote the company and its products. This non-neutral slant of EarthInTheUniverse is only seen after examining a great many of the edits, to get a sense of the bias introduced. For instance, in this sequence of 16 edits, EarthInTheUniverse reduced the technical details such as removing a bit about the support beams, and removing the fact that German physicist Hermann von Helmholtz helped Steinway invent the duplex vibration scheme of the piano strings. The editor interaction tool shows a remarkable unity of purpose between Fanoftheworld and the various socks including EarthInTheUniverse. One interesting note is that there were eight years of difference between EarthInTheUniverse and Fanoftheworld editing the category of Steinway and the article about the LaGuardia-Wagner Archives, an infrequently visited page. This sockmaster is playing the long game. Binksternet (talk) 01:29, 20 July 2018 (UTC)

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

Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments
EarthInTheUniverse and are ✅ to each other, blocked and tagged. Closing.--Bbb23 (talk) 14:52, 20 July 2018 (UTC)

Suspected sockpuppets



 * 1) st User was blocked only two weeks ago on DE:WP for promoting Steinway D'274 Artists; see, and  (Sadly cannot see more details because those were supervised due to legal Youth protection)
 * 2) nd User is actually promoting Steinway Products in a wide spread Additional this user is, (as a well known behaviour from Fanoftheworld) uploading a plenty of copyvio pictures supporting Steinway Products. see  and  for this.

--LexICon (talk) (sysop @ wp:de ) 01:19, 21 March 2020 (UTC)


 * Note: Barbara.klein32 has been renamed to Mitulski, reported in the DE:WP today due to repeated promotional abuse. 77.116.212.1 (talk) 03:58, 22 May 2020 (UTC)