Wikipedia:Suspected sock puppets/66.23.224.223

User:66.23.224.223

 * Suspected sockpuppeteer


 * Suspected sockpuppets


 * Report submission by

gorgan_almighty 11:39, 26 October 2007 (UTC)

The puppetmaster started out by creating an article for his product, which was deleted at AfD. During the AfD, puppetmaster claimed several times that if his article is deleted, so should every article on network management software.
 * Evidence

After the AfD closed, puppetmaster vandalised the AfD page.

When the vandalism was reverted, the puppetmaster revealed his sockpuppet by using it to restore the vandalised version

The sockpuppet is now making a WP:POINT by sifting through Wikipedia nominating all articles about network monitoring software that he can find (     , and the list goes on and on). Admins have been reverting his nominations as invalid.

Update: The sockpuppet continues to add AutoNOC to the List of network management systems article.


 * Comments

Comment from User 66.23.224.223:


 * This is also our account "Popperian". We will try to post on the account.  Our prior account was deleted.  This is actually a dynamic IP that is re-assigned every 30 days.  We have plenty of other IPs we can but in an attempt of good faith we have used the same one, because we believe the issues are actually legitimate.  It is not quite the mischievous the administrator has repeatedly been accusing us of for weeks as he deletes our page revisions.


 * After administrators ignored requests to review these pages and began reverting our AfD requests for review for only selected pages that legitimately need review, we posted on Sysop page, Coredesat to request review for these pages.


 * The administrator listed did not actually perform an accurate review of the AfD change requests made. We did not mark all these pages to be deleted.  We marked the ones that actually need review (advertisement, no references, not-notable).  Articles by publically traded companies, or very well known names were not asked for review.  We only requested deletion review for the actual articles that should be revieed.  Other editors have expressed the same comment and agreement with us that "Yes many of these articles do need to be reviewed and appear to violate the same terms".


 * We are in the process of terminating all involvement with Wikipedia. We are obviously not wanted here.  We are also requesting all trademarked and copyrighted information that we have deleted from commentaries be removed.  Please do not revert these deletions of copyrighted and trademark material.  In the cases of the deletions, the rights of use to these registered trademarks and copyrights have been revoked.


 * Our experience in this process has been such that we will join the camps of Educators, and Education Boards and others in requesting the banning of Wikipedia in schools and in other forums because the system isn't quite so "open" as people want to claim. The administrators control it, only who knows exactly who these people are, and the administrators have already admitted they are highly biased about what content they allow and what they censor and that has certainly been our experience. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Popperian (talk • contribs)

Additional comments by submitter:
 * The puppetmaster couldn't resist vandalising the evidence section of this page when he submitted his above comments
 * You have repeatedly violated our registered trademarks. We will delete all improper use of our trademarks meant to inflict harm upon us.


 * The puppetmaster's comments do not explain why the sockpuppet vandalised the concluded AfD, or why the sockpuppet is going on a rampage of AfD nominations against network management articles.
 * Get over yourself, I already think you are an idiot. It was not a rampage.  I have been reviewing these articles for more than a year in the frustration of the bias we are receiving.  I went through a selected set of the articles that should be deleted for the same reason our article was purged and I requested review for them and posted my comments.  Isn't this how Wikipedia is supposed to work?  Or is it just the  "Gorgan almighty" biased world? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Popperian (talk • contribs)

&mdash;gorgan_almighty 12:16, 26 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Unintentional, didn't realize it had passed AfD. If it has passed AfD, I disagree with it, and that article should still be deleted for the same reason our article was deleted. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Popperian (talk • contribs)

Comment from User 66.23.224.223:
 * The administrator in question is using our registered trademark without our authorization. He been specifically told that his use of this trademark has been revoked because he has been abusing it with the intent to cause harm or injure our company.  We request all copyrighted material that we removed and trademarks that we removed and related changes to be made permanent.
 * This administrator should be banned from modifying any articles posted by us. He has already indicated a high level of personal bias. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Popperian (talk • contribs)


 * Regardless of the outcome of this sockpuppetry case, I think the AfDs should proceed since there are a number of articles on that list that are adverts and should probably be deleted. -- A. B. (talk) 12:24, 26 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Finally a Sane Administrator! We have no problem with deleting our article, all we ask is the same policies applied to us be applied to all others.  Please put this guy in charge of all NMS entries.  This gorgan_almighty guy has been harassing us for more than a week, he has violated our trademarks, he has re-posted copyrighted material.  And now he is trying to get us banned. He should have administrator privileges revoked.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Popperian (talk • contribs) 12:30, 26 October 2007 (UTC)
 * I have no comment on whether those other AfDs should continue or not. I was not the one who reverted them.  Feel free to do a procedural re-open of them if you like.  &mdash;gorgan_almighty 12:43, 26 October 2007 (UTC)
 * The other articles we marked for AfD need to also be reviewed. The article we originally posted that the SysOp purged has an equal number of third party links prior to the purge, I am not sure if he actually reviewed the page prior to purging or made the delete based on Gorgan's old commentary.  However, this article should be recovered because it was better quality than many of the others you appear to be keeping.  Cases in point:  Zenoss, Zabbix, and Xrate.  Why are these articles not subject to the same scrutiny from Gorgan_Almighty and his band of "un-biased editing saints"?   Our article was their equal, our technology more widely deployed, but for some reason these are exempted from review?
 * The Zenoss and Zabbix articles are in bad shape and need a clean-up, but the links in their reference sections clearly show that they have been the subject of "significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject". Xrate, on the other hand, does not appear to be notable enough for inclusion.  I have tagged it for suspected lack of notability, and if no sources are added, I'll nominate it at AfD.  &mdash;gorgan_almighty 13:24, 26 October 2007 (UTC)
 * All of the AfDs I posted should be reviewed. Since it has been advised that I stay away from the NMS section for COI reasons (which I agree with) ... I'm not going to touch it.  However, all AfDs I posted should be reviewed, and I personally think the entire list should be deleted, either that, or all 300-or-so production verifiable NMS included. The latter is what I think should actually be done.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Popperian (talk • contribs) 13:56, 26 October 2007 (UTC)


 * The sockpuppet's "dynamic IP" explanation also does not explain why the sockpuppet keeps adding AutoNOC to the List of network management systems (as noted in the update to the evidence section). If the sockpuppet really was a different user entirely, then why would he do this? &mdash;gorgan_almighty 12:53, 26 October 2007 (UTC)
 * No offense Gorgan - but you really shouldn't even touch our edits ... you are already trying to get us banned.


 * Either way, Popperian seems to be a vandalism-only account. &mdash;gorgan_almighty 12:54, 26 October 2007 (UTC)
 * It is a brand new account created as a result of this debate. I plan to keep the account, presuming it doesn't get deleted and use it for all future edits. My interests are not just NMS related although that is what keeps the lights on. We originally had an account in the page name but can no longer get into it.  We would have done all edits in the page name if not for having lost access ti he account form more than a year ago.  I am not trying to deceive, vandalize, or harm Wikipedia. My existing opinion, however, is that it is a highly biased, inconsistent, and censoring media form, not at all what I expected.  I actually know a lot more about this market than the administrator and am multi-decade expert in the market.  Not a single change I have made constitutes real vandalism.  Every edit I have made has been either (1) to add more information, in a high quality manner to Wikipedia, or (2)  after the information I added was deleted by "Gorgan_Almighty" to apply the same deletion policy in a fair, uniform, consistent manner to other such pages.  I would not have marked any page for AfD had administrators actually reviewed them themselves after I requested review approximately 20 times.  But the pages I marked for AfD need to be reviewed, and perferably deleted ... at least if you plan to purge our pages. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Popperian (talk • contribs)
 * If you really are prepared to "reject your old ways" so-to-speak, and start editing Wikipedia in an appropriate unbiased manner, then I think you may deserve to be given a chance. I suggest you stay away from network management articles, as you have demonstrated a conflict of interest in that area.  I recommend that the concluding admin considers this course of action. &mdash;gorgan_almighty 13:24, 26 October 2007 (UTC)
 * There was nothing wrong with my "old ways". The issues haven't changed, going on for a year now.  Once these issues are cleaned up, I have every intention of staying away from NMS articles providing the AfD's I requested are carried out.  Someone who knows the NMS market really needs to be put in charge of cleaning it up, and I personally believe that page should list all 300 or so of the primary existing production NMS that are out there.  Ours and the others.  300 is not too big of a number and peer-edited review is actually a valuable reference for customers.  Don't worry - I'm not going to do that for you guys, I've already had my fill of dealing with WikiBias. Editors definitely have it completely wrong if they think it's some kind of an advertising boon to be listed on that page, one year of page listing, and not one qualified referral from it.  The only thing to come from it has been grief and waste time.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Popperian (talk • contribs) 13:53, 26 October 2007 (UTC)


 * For what it is worth, I personally think this entire discussion is stupid, as were Gorgan and ThomJakobsons edits. They obviously don't have a clue about the NMS market and really don't know what they are doing.  If you guys want to know what you should be doing ... it is pretty simple: Wikipedia's policy should be to aggregate all related summary NMS knowledge for verifiably real products and companies.  This may be the "attempted" policy currently, but it has been a complete failure as it disallows anything that isn't either free software or software from large monopolies.  If someone is clearly trying to spread viruses or something, ya, delete it, but the Internet actually does need a quality, comprehensive list of NMS.  There are about 300 of these in existence to my knowledge and my personal feeling is that ALL of these should be listed, our page, and the other pages.  I do not believe the advertising/promotional value of the link is significant, at least not in my experience.  However, a high quality general NMS list that differentiates between the complexities of the products will actually provide a lot of value to the public.  I am routinely requested for such information from many people trying to figure this market out because they can't figure it out.  All of my edits have been a function of this perspective.  I am neither vandal, nor advertiser, nor blind promoter as I have been accused.  My message has been the same for more than a year and not one administrator (except the guy above) has paid attention.  Either delete it all or keep it and make it fair and consistent.  There shouldn't be this non-sensical, biased NMS list that exists right now. It is wrong to selectively and almost randomly censor certain products and technologies.  If you can't figure out what policy you want to do here (I think you should keep everything that is verifiably legitimate) ... it's just going to be a nightmare, and I'm going to come back in another 30 days and we will have this battle all over again.  Delete it all or keep everything that is verifiable real and accurate.  Comparisons between the products and feature/platform differentiations would probably be very valuable to the general public ... but the existing list is biased crap that specifically censors anything that isn't from a large monopoly or isn't free software. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Popperian (talk • contribs)


 * I am not going to comment any more on this subject, as I believe I have said all there is to say. I will leave the rest up to the concluding admin (although I will still revert any attempted vandalism to this page, or any other). &mdash;gorgan_almighty 13:24, 26 October 2007 (UTC)
 * And you (and ThomJakobson) have been informed that you are using our trademarks in a manner that we do not authorize in such a way that what we believe has the specific and intentional intent of harming our company. You tracked our IP addresses down and published personal information and are harassing us.  Guess what, you visited our website and we also have your IP address.  If you continue to harass us, we will take legal action.
 * Use of trademarks in commentary has no protection in trademark law, which I suspect you already know. As for "copyright violations": you agreed to licence your comments under the GFDL when you posted them; this is displayed on the page when you submit them. You can't revoke such licensing afterwards, so deleting them claiming "copyright/trademark violation" is vandalism, and it distorts the record of the discussion. As for "published personal information": your IP address was recorded in the publicly accessible edit summary when you removed the deletion notice and made changes to the article. I didn't "track down" anything, you left that information on public display and I pointed out that the IP editor to the article might have some connection with the company concerned due to geographical proximity. You confirmed that, not me, so the only disclosure of personal information has been on your part. Thomjakobsen 14:02, 26 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Thomjakobsen and Gorgan, you have been informed that it is our view that both of you are harassing us and using our trademarks in such a manner as to intentionally inflict harm on us. You have been warned.


 * I will revisit these things in 30 days, hopefully someone cleans up this mess. I ask editors to debate and formulate a clean, clear policy that is free from bias as to who should and should not be included on the NMS list and probably others.  I will not touch NMS listings as per requests.  If you don't come up with a clean, clear, fair policy ... the only thing that's going to happen is more grief and wasted time for all of us!
 * There is a clean, clear, fair, and widely accepted policy already. Please read this and this. Any article, NMS or otherwise, that meets these requirements will be included. Those that do not, will be deleted. That policy is the gold standard for inclusion. Any other consideration regarding popularity or importance is irrelevant. Arakunem 15:03, 26 October 2007 (UTC)


 * First of all, to clear something up for Popperian, I'm not an admin -- just an editor. Second, If these AfDs have been put on hold, then I suggest reactivating them a few at a time per my comments at User talk:Popperian -- 20+ related AfDs is a lot to digest if the nominator has not done prior legwork on notability issues. -- A. B. (talk) 15:11, 26 October 2007 (UTC)

User:Popperian acknowledges that he/they has been editing as 66.23.224.223. I see what might be some technical violations of the sockpuppet policy here--in particular, both the IP and the named account participated in Articles for deletion/AutoNOC. To avoid being accused of violating the sockpuppet policy, it's best if you stick to using only the Popperian account, and to make sure that you are always logged in when you edit.
 * Conclusions

There are other user conduct issues that are more important here than sockpuppetry. First, Popperian's use of "we" and "us" in the posts above strongly suggest that multiple people are editing under the Popperian account. This is not allowed by Wikipedia policy, and unless you can confirm that the account is being used by one, and only one person, I will block the account from editing.

Also, Popperian's comments about the alleged trademark abuse--especially the comment "Thomjakobsen and Gorgan, you have been informed that it is our view that both of you are harassing us and using our trademarks in such a manner as to intentionally inflict harm on us. You have been warned." violates the spirit, if not the letter, of Wikipedia's No Legal Threats policy. If you continue to use legalistic language in this manner, there's a strong possibility that your account will be blocked from editing. --Akhilleus (talk) 16:25, 26 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Legal concerns generally resolved, this was appreciated. The courtesy blank was appreciated, if possible, to clean up all remaining issues, no edits we make seem to last very long, and any edit we make appears to open some other can of worms ... so can someone please also courtesy blank this page Talk/IP and this one Talk:User. Someone appears to have unrecoverably deleted the only thing that was actually desired on this site (namely information on the NMS list with the other listings), so no more real plans to use Wikipedia further. What is the point when everything we do is recorded for eternity but things may be permanently deleted by people whom we view as highly biased against us?  We took down the sister wiki server for this project and mediawiki this morning. It would actually be a favor if you deleted this account and all other such references.  We are done with Wikipedia, it causes far more problem than is useful, thanks for the people who helped.