Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Rosswikieditor/Archive

Suspected sockpuppets



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User:Rosswikieditor is a single-purpose account, whose edits for the past two years have been dedicated to removing descriptions of Jack Buckby as far-right in his article. In particular, he persistently writes that Buckby was formerly far-right, but no longer is, such as in these diffs:, ,.

The user returned to editing yesterday after more than a year away. He changed "far-right" in the lead to "right-wing" here at 22:52 on 7 September and again here, counter-reverting me. Rosswikieditor also used a number of arguments in favour of his advocacy that Buckby is not far-right, initially justifying his position based on a book the subject wrote before focusing instead on an interview with Channel 4, which has been the emphasis of his edits since his 2021 return:, ,.

The IP editor 96.240.12.35 made one edit to Bibliography of Donald Trump in December 2020 before making edits to Jack Buckby earlier today. Three minutes after Rosswikieditor commented on his own Talk page to defend himself from accusations of vandalism, 96.240.12.35 made the same reversion that Rosswikieditor previously did:. 15 minutes after Rosswikieditor mistakenly (?) posted on the IP's Talk page, the IP account made the same reversion again. Later, Rosswikieditor posted on Talk:Jack Buckby here and three minutes later, the IP account made its third and, at present, final reversion of the same edit. In all three edit summaries, the IP editor makes the current vs past distinction, and in the latest edit summary makes the same point about the Channel 4 interview that Rosswikieditor has been focusing on. Both the IP editor and Rosswikieditor leave long, multi-sentence editor summaries, have both returned to editing Wikipedia in recent days, make the same edit with the same reasoning and make up an editing timeline consistent with Rosswikieditor logging out to edit as an IP user in order to avoid sanctions for edit warring, which he has previously been warned about. I think this constitutes compelling behavioural evidence that Rosswikieditor is using an IP sockpuppet. Ralbegen (talk) 19:48, 8 September 2021 (UTC)


 * I've added 2600:6C50:5C00:D1D:D0C2:70A8:CF7A:5515 to the list, an IP which has never edited before which made similar changes to Rosswikieditor minutes after Rosswikieditor completed another batch of editing activity. Ralbegen (talk) 21:17, 8 September 2021 (UTC)

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

I don't even know what an IP sockpuppet is. If you are implying I have more than one account, that is untrue. I do know, however, that somebody else joined in the editing to prevent people from wrongly listing Jack Buckby - a former far-right activist who condemns the far-right in a book, in multiple interviews, and in a research paper - as far-right. It is absolutely nonsensical. Why is it nobody else, who provides zero evidence of this claim being true, is being accused of breaking Wikipedia rules?

I have seen multiple people edit this page repeatedly without being classified as breaking the rules, and without being banned. They claim Buckby is far-right when there is a wealth of evidence (a book, a research paper, and interviews - all of which explicitly condemn the far right, not just the far left) - and yet this page is continually vandalised. Why? Is this a source of information or an opinion column? Rosswikieditor (talk) 20:38, 8 September 2021 (UTC)

Furthermore, I have no reason to use more than one account. I have this one and it is sufficient. Has it not occurred to you that other people may not notice that it is incorrect to label someone far-right by using years-old news stories that relate to this person before they changed? We have evidence, in the article itself, that Buckby left the far right and condemns the far right. It is literally in this article. Clearly I'm not the only person who notices that flagrant ignorance of the truth.

Wikipedia does also have policies that stress the importance of using the most up to date information to ensure pages are accurate. This page, as it stands, is inaccurate. Buckby is not far right. I have read his books, research, columns, and seen his interviews in which he condemns the far right repeatedly.

Why can nobody answer this simple question: why is this evidence being ignored? Rosswikieditor (talk) 20:48, 8 September 2021 (UTC)

95.148.249.214 edit warred and changed this page six times without providing evidence for the false claim that Buckby - currently - is far right. I have followed the rules consistently when editing this page, and yet I am the one being targeted. Rosswikieditor (talk) 20:51, 8 September 2021 (UTC)

Can something please be done about this user and their obsession with rewriting Jack Buckby’s history. The fact they monitor the page and use sock puppet accounts to this degree indicates to me they are a disingenuous user that is likely gaining some sort of benefit from their actions. They can never provide a source that Buckby is not a far-right figure and constantly vandalise the page by undoing verifiable edits. 2.26.180.32 (talk) 06:50, 9 September 2021 (UTC)

Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments

 * I issued uw-login and I think that's enough for now. If there's issues with edit warring, that can be dealt with in other ways.  Editors are allowed to have unpopular opinions, and are allowed to focus on a single topic.  Neither of those are socking. -- RoySmith (talk) 14:57, 16 September 2021 (UTC)