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August 2024: blocked as sock

This user's unblock request has been reviewed by an administrator, who accepted the request.

Roggenwolf (block log • active blocks • global blocks • contribs • deleted contribs • filter log • creation log • change block settings • unblock • checkuser (log))

---

Request reason:

All the following:

(a) Oldstone James and his sockpuppets speak English such as – as an editor that I normally disagree with at a time considered to be the sockpuppets' defining features – commonly mention their "fluency in Russian, and both share an apparent interest in linguistics, as well."[1] Now, that Oldstone James speaks Russian is easily established,[2], but he apparently also speaks French.[3] I, however, personally speak English and German (and at a perfectly idiomatic level, not the mistaken one I seem to have selected on my user page); which I am quite open to proving by whatever avenue (e.g. any amount of non-trivial de.wiki edits,[4] scheduled translations, third party zoom call...) you may choose.

(b) I currently live in Germany and have only ever contributed from German IP addresses; and please simply have a CheckUser verify that claim.

Correction 1 by Biohistorian15: By now, the puppet master has apparently already submitted a (soon reverted) statement in my defense below, in which they state of Germany:[5]

"It's where I lived at the time of my site ban. This is likely why CheckUser has identified your sockuppetry as possible. In case it may be helpful, I lived in Berlin."

I would like to put on record that I have never lived (nor edited) in Berlin whatsoever. I ask CheckUsers to please verify this crucial fact all for themselves!

(c) I also started my wiki "career" mostly over at the much more relaxed (en.)wikiquote, where I accrued ~2400 edits before publicly realizing that nobody even reads those articles anyways (cf. e.g. [6] of multiple). Note that the other user has a mere 3 minuscule edits on the project, none of which relate to politics at all.[7]

(d) The user(s) I stand accused of being a sockpuppet of, furthermore, also edit in a totally different time zone than I do; if you exclude sleepless nights, in which I naturally edit in both mine and theirs. See my addendum below for more details.

Correction 2 by Biohistorian15 is also necessary in light of the puppet master's apparent admission to have lived in Germany at least for some time.[8] In any case, I maintain that the editing clearly followed a very different daily pattern (that can not easily be explained away by uninterrupted segments away at work etc.). For one, I can't have blue light too late in the day or I will not be sleeping well. Since I sometimes cannot help this, I've probably pulled lots of fully functional all-nighters; that's not a common thing for people to do, is it? I think this, to some extent, still sets me apart from the other accounts.

(e) Regarding arguably the very last vestige of WP:DUCK in this case, namely a potential overlap in the users' content, I would like to advance a semi-quantifiable argument. We'll intuitively go step by step to get there:

(1) Note that Oldstone James at the time of his block had roughly as many edits as I had at the time of mine. (2) Please diligently review the following two pairs of links I generated with Xtools commonly used (and accepted) in SPIs: [9] and [10], such as: [11] and [12]. Finally note that per the Editor Interaction Analyser tool, the acting admin has almost twice as much overlap with my supposed puppet master than I do with him; and per the Intersect Contribs tool, I have an overlap of 41 articles with my supposed puppet master, while my accuser has an overlap of 61. (3) Quod erat demonstrandum, ScottishFinnishRadish is apparently more likely to be the aforementioned sockpuppet than I am.

Please don't tell me this is good enough evidence to even get started here. No matter what else happens, WP:NOTFISHING should have long overruled any other reasons for the CU by this point.

After all, sure, if you throw the dice long enough, you'll find somebody that, in the past, lived in some (albeit different) part of the same 83.8 million inhabitant country as I now do.

What's more, I certainly do not share any of the user's pronounced and well-established fixations on things like chess (cf. many such edits by the two actual sockpuppets[13][14]), soccer or creationism (cf. e.g. [15], [16], [17], [18]; he even received a topic ban [19]...), all of which I'd personally happen to find rather tedious. Nor have I engaged in the socks' established behavioral pattern of editing various linguistics articles only an Eastern European would really know much about to begin with (cf. e.g. [20], [21], [22], [23], [24], [25] ...).
Furthermore, what some users in the SPI argue to have been the supposed puppet master's main focus,[26] the race and intelligence article, I merely edited (and immediately self-reverted) a single time by mistake when I was first experimenting with Twinkle[27] (In fact, I was so inexperienced at the time that I remember for some reason not managing to do a full manual revert without first modifying some of the text; which was, why I simultaneously also made an addition to the "See also" by the way).

(f) Oldstone James' original SPI was justified originally along the following lines:[28]

"On 18 January [2020], Oldstone James attempted to appeal his creationism topic ban. it quickly became apparent this wasn't likely to succeed, and it was SNOW-closed. NaìuviaAeo was created a day later."

Why would my supposed puppet master have created a sock puppet long before any of this? My account was created in 2018, not 2020. Another line of evidence so obvious that I do no longer believe in mere negligence at play here.

(g) Or might all this actually be about my (now already reverted because of this block for some reason),[29] talk page edit right before this sudden block, where I had constructively criticized a section relating to WP policy on sockpuppetry for being worded inappropriately? Now, please don't tell me an actual sockpuppet would make edits like that while already engulfed in other content-level controversies left and right... Biohistorian15 (talk) 22:19, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

Accept reason:

With the recent activity of Oldstone James more recent technical data became available to checkusers that I'm told demonstrates that it is less likely that you are also a sock. As my original block was based on behavioral evidence weighed against a possible/possilikely CU result, a result which has been superceded, I am unblocking you. I apologize for the misunderstanding and the time it took for resolution. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 22:13, 1 September 2024 (UTC)

Full Addendum regarding my "different time zones" objection

The following are averages. I have chosen myself and the two most prominent targets of the original SPI for us to analyze. The diagrams paints a relatively consistent picture I'd argue. Yet more, my diagram would look entirely different if it weren't for the 1 sleepless night I have been "enjoying" every ~1-2 weeks throughout the last year. Please verify for yourself that I, indeed, edited all throughout these 24+h days though!

Biohistorian15 Generated using XTools on 2024-08-30 09:02 Time card

	0:00	1:00	2:00	3:00	4:00	5:00	6:00	7:00	8:00	9:00	10:00	11:00	12:00	13:00	14:00	15:00	16:00	17:00	18:00	19:00	20:00	21:00	22:00	23:00
Sunday	6	6	8	10	4	3	10	16	20	36	27	32	30	27	36	25	34	37	43	31	14	9	5	6
Monday	7	15	6	1	2	8	38	19	29	34	34	54	40	44	32	27	26	21	21	31	7	0	0	0
Tuesday	1	6	8	4	8	11	9	5	10	25	20	39	53	43	44	71	36	32	60	87	11	2	1	5
Wednesday	0	1	11	26	13	52	10	11	52	30	30	60	58	56	30	54	53	48	42	41	12	2	5	0
Thursday	0	0	1	8	5	1	5	17	28	26	38	17	73	74	39	27	90	42	55	35	14	3	9	4
Friday	3	5	0	1	7	7	19	11	24	54	26	30	47	47	30	36	76	47	33	49	26	2	0	4
Saturday	2	2	0	0	0	0	3	7	35	32	52	44	27	31	29	18	39	41	17	51	5	0	1	2

Oldstone James Generated using XTools on 2024-08-10 10:04 Time card

	0:00	1:00	2:00	3:00	4:00	5:00	6:00	7:00	8:00	9:00	10:00	11:00	12:00	13:00	14:00	15:00	16:00	17:00	18:00	19:00	20:00	21:00	22:00	23:00
Sunday	18	13	14	17	2	1	0	0	7	15	8	10	33	43	19	37	25	24	46	43	51	57	45	31
Monday	27	9	8	4	0	2	2	3	11	10	9	11	14	21	14	31	16	29	39	43	59	32	26	20
Tuesday	6	11	7	0	0	1	0	3	2	5	11	7	12	12	20	19	21	34	44	29	43	36	53	38
Wednesday	19	10	8	8	3	1	3	0	4	1	15	1	21	17	19	41	32	51	32	17	28	34	26	10
Thursday	10	9	10	7	7	3	0	1	0	2	10	13	5	10	21	12	38	32	26	13	28	25	30	15
Friday	14	25	21	10	0	4	2	6	8	0	4	14	22	26	26	25	42	58	48	58	37	50	78	46
Saturday	19	12	12	4	2	5	0	0	8	4	19	21	30	41	47	25	34	36	24	43	41	25	28	31

Maxipups Mamsipupsovich Generated using XTools on 2024-08-10 10:04 Time card

	0:00	1:00	2:00	3:00	4:00	5:00	6:00	7:00	8:00	9:00	10:00	11:00	12:00	13:00	14:00	15:00	16:00	17:00	18:00	19:00	20:00	21:00	22:00	23:00
Sunday	18	11	4	9	0	0	0	0	1	0	2	8	9	12	7	11	18	7	9	11	2	16	11	6
Monday	13	8	6	0	0	2	1	0	4	6	6	10	7	7	3	2	8	7	10	12	21	9	11	9
Tuesday	5	8	7	0	0	0	0	0	0	5	7	7	5	18	12	12	15	6	2	8	9	3	7	8
Wednesday	13	7	1	2	0	1	0	0	0	5	3	5	7	3	6	4	5	4	3	12	1	2	5	3
Thursday	0	4	4	9	2	6	2	2	0	0	4	7	3	6	3	3	8	6	3	3	6	10	4	8
Friday	7	3	5	0	1	0	1	0	1	11	7	6	11	12	13	15	7	3	1	2	6	4	5	6
Saturday	6	2	0	5	2	5	1	5	4	5	7	12	23	5	7	5	1	2	12	2	17	27	9	24

Biohistorian15 (talk) 10:23, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

Comments

Are you actually serious about being unblocked? If so, you really should rewrite this in a manner that there's an admin out there that would take this seriously. You basically use an unblock request as a vehicle to continue your personal grudges and make demands of admins. If anything, this will just get your talk page access removed, and that greatly reduces the chances of ever being unblocked. An unblock request is solely about your conduct, and how you plan to act in the future. Even if you are not, in fact, a sockpuppet, your WP:BATTLEGROUND behavior provides more than enough justification to keep you blocked, for the benefit of Wikipedia. CoffeeCrumbs (talk) 07:14, 9 August 2024 (UTC)

Thank you, CoffeeCrumbs, I have now removed the paragraph you were likely referring to. Now, it's not like I was entirely unjustified adding it originally, as the people concerned have, indeed, made statements to the effect that they could easily get me banned... I wrote it last night as I was trying to understand why an admin might have wanted me gone from the plattform at all... But you're right, it only distracts from my actual arguments. Biohistorian15 (talk) 07:22, 9 August 2024 (UTC)

Thread that may first look like an admin already took on the case, but ended with them not wanting to be involved at all
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
All enwiki Checkusers are Admins. We use technical data to confirm whether accounts are run by the same person. But not to prove they aren't. Doug Weller talk 09:16, 9 August 2024 (UTC) Doug Weller, we too have had serious disagreements only recently (cf. above on the talk page). But I implore you to, at least, publicly verify my justifiable suspicion that I have (most likely) solely contributed from a totally different country than the purported puppet master. I regularly edit from multiple distinct local addresses of mine (as you should be able to verify by geolocating some of the semi-static IPs from my home wifi(s)...) such as using mobile internet; all of which are clearly inconsistent with someone merely abusing some kind of VPN proxy etc. Biohistorian15 (talk) 09:21, 9 August 2024 (UTC) Furthermore, I do not believe Russian citizens – which Oldstone James arguably likely is – have been able to easily get/renew a VISA for my country whatsoever in light of the ongoing war. I, in fact, did not happen to edit on en.wikipedia in a period prior to its outbreak at all... Biohistorian15 (talk) 09:49, 9 August 2024 (UTC) Sorry, I can’t do that. Doug Weller talk 10:09, 9 August 2024 (UTC) As far as I know, you can (given my explicit desire) verify that my part of the story is correct; so long as you don't tell people the exact city I live in, I'd like to add. Biohistorian15 (talk) 10:14, 9 August 2024 (UTC) WP:CHECKME "On some Wikimedia projects, an editor's IP addresses may be checked upon their request, typically to prove innocence against a sockpuppet allegation. Such checks are not allowed on the English Wikipedia and such requests will not be granted." Doug Weller talk 10:59, 9 August 2024 (UTC) Just one problem: it states in the same article under WP:MAGIC8BALL that: "If the user has said they're from a certain region and their IP address confirms that, you are permitted to declare that CheckUser verifies they are." I don't really understand. I suppose this is the global policy that's then overwritten locally... Biohistorian15 (talk) 11:10, 9 August 2024 (UTC) It's for if a CU has been carried out. Sorry, I have run out of time for this. Have you seen my talk page? Please don't contact me again. Doug Weller talk 11:53, 9 August 2024 (UTC) In any case, Doug Weller, could you please help me understand why the acting admin could possibly have been so confident in banning me without so much as opening a courtesy SPI on me etc.; I think I have clearly established above that this is as far from a WP:DUCK as you can get. Biohistorian15 (talk) 11:10, 9 August 2024 (UTC)

I would like to stress: multiple users that I have very recently been engaged in controversies with, are known to mass revert suspected sockpuppet accounts while demonstrating (as I see it) few qualms over the edits' respective value. Accordingly, I'd like to clear my name as swiftly as possible. Just in case, then, I'd like to ask permission to ping one or multiple admins I have – from my personal, subjective perspective, anyway – had relatively positive and constructive interactions with after all. Biohistorian15 (talk) 10:49, 9 August 2024 (UTC)

Since Doug Weller is not interested in the discussion any longer – though, after reading his talk page, I now understand quite well why – I'd like to, against better judgement, summon the acting admin in this block, ScottishFinnishRadish, to help answer this query.

And, in that case, please note that I will not go on to hold it against you, SFR, if you admit that the whole thing was simply a mistake! Biohistorian15 (talk) 12:04, 9 August 2024 (UTC)

I spoke to a checkuser who told me that by technical data it was  Possible to  Possilikely (a mix between possible and likely) on the technical side. I blocked primarily based on behavioral evidence, which is available to the checkusers, but I'm not going to go into in much detail. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 12:16, 9 August 2024 (UTC)

So is that it? I can only tell you who I am not.

For one, could you please put on the record who the exact checkuser was. If, for example, it's someone with a long history of engaging in political controversies, this deserves some special scrutiny by other CUs/the ArbCom, don't you think? (Withdrawn by Biohistorian15 after reading the privacy policy.)

I can only tell you that I am the reclusive type that you'd expect, so I hardly even edited in an internet café or something. I use NordVPN sometimes but then seriously doubt that I used any of their open proxies simultaneously with the other user somehow without it showing up as a blocked IP range. Biohistorian15 (talk) 12:22, 9 August 2024 (UTC)

I think linking to WP:BEANS when I wrote a rather well-diffed rebuttal to any such "behavioral evidence" in my unblocking request above, is amazingly brazen.

Note that I pinged you with an explicit question in mind: may I ping other admins about this matter, without it being WP:CANVASSING? Biohistorian15 (talk) 12:25, 9 August 2024 (UTC)

Go for it, although generally admins don't appreciate being pinged to unblock discussions they're uninvolved in. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 12:27, 9 August 2024 (UTC)

In that case: I have posed open-ended questions to Ad Orientem in the past, and received helpful responses. Furthermore, when it comes to relatively neutral and wholly uninvolved admins with CU privileges, I'd like to first bring in the following people, any one of which may, of course, decline the request, but is still asked to please not prematurely close anything here: Aoidh and Cabayi.

If any of these three, in fact, doesn't "appreciate being pinged to unblock discussions they're uninvolved in", I'd like them to please carefully consider one important ramification of this discussion here: as far as I know, I am currently the only consistently right-leaning editor with a broad spectrum of academic – rather than first-order political – interests to be found on this entire platform (Trust me this much if you trust me at all, as I have spent the last few months going through thousands of user contribution pages just to be certain!)
Now, to the left of me, there is about twenty odd people that may absolutely be trusted to have their perspective heard in this way. Saying this may be against WP:POINT, but I don't really care. I did originally come here with the intention to counter excessive (and, as it turns out, often policy-inconsistent) activism I kept on discovering in the contributions of this de facto cabal.

You might dislike me for my views, so be it. But this block should not be performed on a whim, and I think I am right to hereby begin my call for a dozen or so third opinions on the matter. I can only tell you one more time that I don't have anything to do with Oldstone James and desperately don't want the end of my wiki-career to be the setting of a seriously dangerous precedent. Biohistorian15 (talk) 13:14, 9 August 2024 (UTC)

Before anyone has the brilliant idea to switch my ban from the current one to one per WP:NOTHERE because of this reply (above), I'd like to state in no uncertain terms:

I was/am specifically referring to fewer than a dozen long-term POV-pushing accounts that commonly violate policy without being kept in check. I had, coincidentally, given out (more or less final) user warnings – whatever that's worth – to multiple of these in the two days prior to my block. It made perfect sense that I brought them up to contextualize my so far entirely unexplained ban.

I am, however, not referring to the Wikipedia community in general. Biohistorian15 (talk) 10:56, 14 August 2024 (UTC)

Off target and or even actively false flag discussion by IP user
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
For a few hours I've tried to decide whether to mention something here or not. It relates to Biohistorian's point above, so now I'll say it. Admins reviewing his block should know that this post at Facebook was made about an hour after he was blocked. [30] The post can't be directly linked to because it's only viewable to that person's FB friends. I don't feel comfortable discussing the context of that post or the background of who made it, but the admins commenting here might be already aware of those details. 84.212.187.87 (talk) 13:39, 9 August 2024 (UTC) Ok, this may surely be an attempt at WP:MEATPUPPETRY, but, again, please do not close anything prematurely here. It doesn't really matter, insofar as only a bold ruling by admins and or CUs (such as, later on, ArbCom members) could still absolve me anyways...Furthermore, it should also be noted that the IP's png is entirely unverifiable in any case. Biohistorian15 (talk) 13:47, 9 August 2024 (UTC) You misunderstood why I mentioned this. I'm not at all glad that you were blocked. But apparently that post's author is, and the admins reviewing this discussion should be aware he's bragging about it. From Ad Orientem's comment below it seems that now it's too late to change anything, but this could at least be mentioned to Arbcom, if you decide to appeal your block there. It's very likely they know who that person is. 84.212.187.87 (talk) 14:29, 9 August 2024 (UTC) Thank you for looking into all of this, but if this is the same Emil O. W. Kirkegaard that also runs a prominent racialist blog such as edits a journal which – while also, surely, receiving unfair coverage on WP to some extent – isn't perfectly unbiased as far as I can tell, this won't exactly help. ... If anything, he might consider my ban a negative. Biohistorian15 (talk) 14:42, 9 August 2024 (UTC)

Sorry, but I don't have checkuser rights and am not going to 2nd guess another admin's sock block when I am unfamiliar with the individuals and evidence. A checkuser is likely your best hope. If that has been done and failed to clear you, then any further appeals are unlikely to receive serious consideration. Yes, you can appeal directly to Arbcom, or ask that an appeal be filed on your behalf at WP:AN. but IMO neither are likely to go anywhere and appeals that are seen as frivolous will at some point end with talk page and email privileges being revoked. That said, I am now stepping away from this discussion. -Ad Orientem (talk) 14:09, 9 August 2024 (UTC)

Thank you in any case! I am willing to see this dispute through as far as that may go; out of mere principle. If anyone really thinks this is my nth sock puppet, maybe they should also think about why I wouldn't just move on right away like the previous user(s) apparently did. Biohistorian15 (talk) 14:12, 9 August 2024 (UTC)

FWIW, the best way to get unblocked would be the standard offer in your case. Go 6 months without creating any new accounts, and then request an unblock with a good reason why. That might get you back on the project. Jdcomix (talk) 14:52, 9 August 2024 (UTC)

Thank you, but I, quite frankly, haven't created any sock puppets at all. I think the stakes in this conversation are actually much higher than many of the contributors may realize; especially noting my claim that I am currently "the only consistently right-leaning editor..." on this platform with any semblance of serious output.

If I can be blocked as a sock puppet of some other user without any real behavioral evidence etc., then I'd surely soon be gone all over again. I am fairly sure I will not return in the case of a decisive and unjustified (first) dismissal of this request. Biohistorian15 (talk) 15:00, 9 August 2024 (UTC)

>I am currently "the only consistently right-leaning editor..." on this platform with any semblance of serious output.

You're not. And even if you were, that's not a reason to give someone special protections.

>If I can be blocked as a sock puppet of some other user without any real behavioral evidence etc.,

There's a lot of similarity in your content interests. Personally, I don't think that's sufficient, but I don't know all the circumstances behind the scenes. Mason (talk) 17:02, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

I agree with Jdcomix that you'd have a good case for a standard offer.Mason (talk) 17:03, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

Mason, I'd like to note for any onlookers that we too had multiple disputes only recently (cf. above in the talk page), and there are three good faith concerns I have with this comment:

(a) Would that necessarily require an admission of guilt? (I am not going to go that route in light of, one more time, not being that sock puppet...)

(b) Are you quite certain that you are not mocking me here? Honest question. I really don't know for sure, but it appears unlikely to me that the nth (supposed) sock puppet of an old multiple topic-banned account could simply recover and go on like nothing happened.

(c) Does anyone, if that were to happen, restore the ~200 articles (drafts, wholesale sidebar templates, redirects...) I have created that were now already indiscriminately deleted as "ban evasion"... what do I do in 6 months if every single one of my contributions has been reverted; am I even allowed to undo such actions if they made no sense?

It just seems unlikely to me. Biohistorian15 (talk) 17:52, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

I don't know if I'd characterize any of these discussions as disputes. I've thought you've been on a fast track to being banned under WP:ARBR&I, but not as a sock. (But I don't have all the facts via checkuser)

a) I don't know. But what I do know is that going to arbcom is going to make you less likely to get unblocked under a standard offer. You're working in a controversial area and have been warned about edit warring in that area repeatedly. I think its more likely you'll get Wikipedia:BOOMERANGed.

b) Not mocking. Although I do find it amusing that you think you're the only right leaning wikipedia editor. You're definitely a viewpoint minority, no doubt.

c) I think creations that you've been the only one to contribute would get deleted. However, there's definitely reasonable doubt that you're actually a sock.

Mason (talk) 19:26, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

Thank you Mason, your comment was actually quite helpful. I now understand that you were not mocking me. I'd like to qualify (b) some more because I think it does afford my case some special consideration regarding any possible misconduct or negligence:

There are three kinds of right-wing Wikipedians right now. (1) Boring movement conservatives, i.e. currently Trumpists, keen on editing the articles of politicians and current events. (2) Anachronistic catholic trads that self-isolate into articles about church history etc. (3) The (often illicitly) sanctioned, more academic users in areas like Race and intelligence or Sex and gender – or even more generally so (cf. e.g. Trakking's recent 1RR)[31] – that will no longer really get into any more talk page discussions, noticeboard disputes etc. because they've come to distrust every aspect of the project. The latter, I'm convinced, have often already/will eventually come to deploy sock puppets.

I actively was trying my best to be neither of these three. Biohistorian15 (talk) 09:27, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

Not that I still imply ill intent, but I just found a policy, WP:3STRIKES, that directly contradicts the advice I received. Biohistorian15 (talk) 10:02, 13 August 2024 (UTC)

Sigh, I don't really have wisdom for you at this point. If you are a false positive, I don't know what the remedies really are at this point. I tend to not get involved in the block/ban side of things, so it's likely that there are nuances to the policy well beyond my understanding. Your summary of the classes of vocal right wing wikipedia editors sounds about right. Mason (talk) 22:50, 16 August 2024 (UTC)

My old SPI filing is being quoted and misrepresented here. I do not consider an interest in Russian and linguistics to be defining features of this sock farm. I mentioned those at the time to demonstrate the overlap in that specific case. These accounts have never been WP:SPAs. Further, Oldstone James had a demonstrated history of deceptive behavior by creating alt accounts to avoid scrutiny before their main accounts were blocked, etc. so anything they said about themselves should be weighed accordingly. I do not think this editor's style is "significantly different". Both editors are verbose in similar ways. Further, both accounts share a similar interest and perspective on the topic of race and intelligence, as mentioned on the old SPI. The raw quantity of articles which overlap is mostly irrelevant. The substance, POV, and style of those edits are similar. The claim that this sets a "seriously dangerous precedent" is grandiose and silly. Grayfell (talk) 21:39, 9 August 2024 (UTC)

Grayfell, while the following summary may first read like it's mocking you, it's really the wider situation I am referring to:

We're getting to the point now, where I seem to stand accused of being some kind of veritable renaissance man. I apparently speak multiple highly divergent language families at a level that – whatever it's worth -, you still consider "verbose", probably play pretty good chess, constantly travel the world, have sufficient expertise in the Septem artes liberales, so to speak, to always get my way up until precisely the dozen or so accounts I have above alluded to being a "de facto cabal" show up.

The latter part of this being, in fact, the only absolutely invariable pattern I can identify here. I do, in fact, think this sets a "seriously dangerous precedent" insofar as these are all perfectly good reasons for (sock-)banning a good 30% of vaguely European academics in the future that may stumble into one of various untoward content areas (e.g. race and intelligence, sex and gender, behavioral genetics, history of eugenics ...).

This comment of mine is arguably not WP:SOAPBOX or simple narcissicism either as I genuinely worry about other users, in turn, being randomly accused of having been my sock puppets once this discussion peters out. Biohistorian15 (talk) 23:11, 9 August 2024 (UTC)

From what I see, you do not stand accused of speaking multiple highly divergent language families, rather you're being accused of speaking English, Russian, French and German, which are not even of seperate language families, much less highly divergent ones. _WADroughtOfVowels^P 14:17, 18 August 2024 (UTC)

@ADroughtOfVowels, I think Russian and the rest are certainly quite different in nature.

Further, one more time: I have never demonstrated any deep knowledge of speaking anything but English or German. I have, in fact, offered to prove my German skills, although I won't bother spending my time editing any further if I'll remain blocked here anyway. These skills are those of a native speaker.

If I spoke Russian, I would have long bragged about it somewhere, or e.g. used my cultural background at places I have been characteristically absent from; e.g. Template:Conservatism in Russia, the only one of a dozen or so of these templates that I haven't expansively contributed to. Biohistorian15 (talk) 14:36, 18 August 2024 (UTC)

I will, however, now stop replying to de facto WP:SPAs like yourself that were recently created, have a low edit count with strangely much activity at AN/I and yet somehow demonstrate expert knowledge of wikitext. Biohistorian15 (talk) 14:49, 18 August 2024 (UTC)

You have a strange definition of SPA. _WADroughtOfVowels^P 16:52, 18 August 2024 (UTC)

Dude, seriously... Are you an alt account? If you are, please declare it in accordance with WP:VALIDALT before it's too late. Right now, it looks like you did some constructive editing just to start lending extra support in AN/I disputes etc; which would also make you an SPA. Biohistorian15 (talk) 17:02, 18 August 2024 (UTC)

This latest stunt [32] in which "JamesOldstone" somehow came swooping in here after being blocked for four years with a suddenly new sockpuppet to come to your defense, using the same terminology and overwrought, glib style of writing, just about closes this book. CoffeeCrumbs (talk) 04:56, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

I agree, there are some superficial similarities; some arguments to the opposite effect though:

Just remove the pic if you find it inappropriate

• I would never have called another editor "dumb" as that basically guarantees the post being deleted.
• Why would he admit to speaking German when there is otherwise no evidence of his speaking the language? He might have wanted to brag, but how exactly does that help me?
• He used the term "cabal", as in e.g. this picture that is, in fact, commonly used on here (cf. right); I didn't exactly come up with this term.
• What does "glib" even mean? I have been told by every teacher since grade school that I have a peculiar (not necessarily good) writing style. Any details? Biohistorian15 (talk) 08:58, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

  Yeah, not buying any of this at all. CoffeeCrumbs (talk) 10:25, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

  CoffeeCrumbs, you too are one of the users involved here that has a pattern of activism throughout your contributions. Please be mindful of WP:BLUDGEON. Biohistorian15 (talk) 10:30, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

  I've made two comments to you (three now with this). Given you probably ought to be blocked for about a half-dozen things, from WP:RGW to WP:BATTLEGROUND to WP:NPA outside of sockpuppeting, I would say "physician, heal thyself." I will, however, take this as a formal request to no longer reply to you, so I will not; I think it'll be a moot issue very soon anyway. CoffeeCrumbs (talk) 14:25, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

  If/when I am exonorated here, you may well take me to the AN/I over this issue on a seperate occasion. You may, of course, still comment, but repeating the same accusation (cf. the first comment above) in such a fashion is arguably, once more, clearly WP:BLUDGEON.

  As to WP:RGW and WP:NPA I think these do not quite apply; but again, that's not the issue in this discussion either. Biohistorian15 (talk) 14:44, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

Pinged relevant admin that happened to be too busy
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
Since I was permitted to call for third opinions above: I would like to invite the very admin who declined Oldstone James' two sockpuppets' unblock requests in the past,[33][34] namely 331dot, to please reply with a general statement as to the likelihood of me being another sockpuppet of theirs. Please consider all the behavioral evidence I submitted to the contrary in my unblock request. In any case, please do not close the request prematurely though, as my emails to various CheckUsers have not been answered/resulted in the official and complete SPI I have directly called for yet. Biohistorian15 (talk) 11:22, 11 August 2024 (UTC) I do not at present have the time to devote to looking into this matter. 331dot (talk) 12:30, 11 August 2024 (UTC) 331dot, before I close this (sub-)thread too, may I ask if you know any admins without any relevant political history for me to ping here that do have the time to figure out (e.g. after evaluating secret evidence they claim to have[35] in direct correspondence with them) if the acting admin's ban was justified? Biohistorian15 (talk) 12:41, 11 August 2024 (UTC) My advice is that you not ping admins here. Quite frankly I doubt you will find anyone with the time to review this lengthy matter. If you want to make this a trial then you should go to ArbCom. 331dot (talk) 16:39, 11 August 2024 (UTC) Thank you, good to know. I'll now try getting CU evidence by an uninvolved party (i.e. not Doug Weller e.g., who I had a serious dispute with just days prior...) via a complete and standard SPI. And if that, somehow, returns a result like "possible", I'll make a wider case at the ArbCom. Biohistorian15 (talk) 17:38, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

Correction to my statement addressed at Mason above: I am now, in fact, losing all trust in the process as we speak. As far as I know, most IP information is only ever kept for 90 days... I'd imagine, all of a sudden, there won't be good enough CheckUser evidence left to exonerate me... Furthermore, I really shouldn't say that here, but there have been multiple objectively suspicious IP editors/SPAs/suspected socks (I count at least three) that have arguably tried to paint me as some sort of disruptive racist in the comments here by rather strange, entirely indirect means; after all, there just aren't any diffs for such a crass accusation. One of these has even begun taking part in highly specific deletion discussions I had been involved in just days prior to my ban. These have not really been investigated in any capacity either as far as I can tell... Biohistorian15 (talk) 17:23, 16 August 2024 (UTC)

@ScottishFinnishRadish, having mentioned the privacy policy above (i.e. data only being kept accessible by CUs for 90 days),[36], what I'd also like to know is how you claim to have connected me to a user last confirmed to have been active in 2021.[37]Biohistorian15 (talk) 10:14, 18 August 2024 (UTC)

CU data is separate from CU memories and notes. I'm not a checkuser, so I relied on what a checkuser told me of their findings. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 14:09, 18 August 2024 (UTC)

Thanks for responding, @ScottishFinnishRadish. I have read up a lot on policy in the last few days. (a) "CU memory" might well have meant that my purported puppet master lived in Germany (as he admitted before). Not good enough for "possible to possilikely". (b) Presumably rather expansive "CU notes" are, to my knowledge, absolutely not a common practice (cf. e.g. the explicitly specified upper limit for the rare "system backup"[38]). I recommend that the CU personally reach out to the Ombuds commission before further evidence of such activities is discovered. After all, there is no question that I'll manage getting somebody (e.g., in the ArbCom) to officially check the logs relating to my case at some point. Biohistorian15 (talk) 14:27, 18 August 2024 (UTC) No longer relevant. The OC already stated in an email to me – if I understand them correctly – that no "private information" has been (illicitly) used prior to my ban. I didn't exactly ask them to verify that part, but it is helpful nonetheless. This, after all, makes the complete lack of "behavioral evidence" provided to justify my ban even more troubling. Biohistorian15 (talk) 09:26, 27 August 2024 (UTC)

No longer relevant
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
ScottishFinnishRadish, if I make very clear that none of the readers ought to flood the thread here with (in any case mostly irrelevant) support, could I ask a few questions about my situation in the German wiki teahouse? This is important as no relevantly qualified user has so far answered my emails with even basic policy questions at all.Biohistorian15 (talk) 13:41, 20 August 2024 (UTC) Go for it, although different wikipedias have different policies. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 13:52, 20 August 2024 (UTC)

Final Summary of my situation: The acting admin in my ban for supposed sock puppetry, ScottishFinnishRadish, has posited above that, in his inofficial SPI, he received a "possible to possilikely" rating based on the rather old notes or memories of some unnamed CheckUser. If I am not mistaken, there are only really four CUs that had been involved in Olstone James' different SPIs (cf. [39] and [40] for verification): Mz7, L235, Oshwah and Guerillero. Memory will hardly be sufficient, and so explicit notes must have been what led to this. There may have been some error in the way these notes were originally taken down and/or have been interpreted prior to my ban.

I ask all four (or ideally three) of you to approach ScottishFinnishRadish to find out which exact CU conducted my investigation on the 08.08.24. Then, please directly access their purported evidence and compare it against any reliable notes you may hopefully still have from your own past involvement in the case. If you can easily access the actual CU logs from all those years back, please check these as well. If you find any discrepancies in that SPI that'd be consistent with minor negligence, this may already be good enough to de-escalate the situation behind the scenes. Please all do that soon, otherwise you are almost invariably going to be approached with yet more detailed queries during my ArbCom follow-up. Biohistorian15 (talk) 09:17, 27 August 2024 (UTC)

Since nobody seems to have even read this, I would like to ping the involved parties (i.e., Mz7, L235, Oshwah and Guerillero) one more time. The case against me is objectively about as weak as it gets, and I'd greatly appreciate if somebody spent 20 minutes actually looking at any evidence they might still have from 3 years ago... Biohistorian15 (talk) 08:58, 30 August 2024 (UTC)

Hi Biohistorian15! I apologize for the delay with getting back to you. I saw your ping here. I've unfortunately been busy with... life stuff (where I'm going to move, whether or not I have to find a new job before I move, etc). As you can imagine, it comes with some stress and it takes time to figure out. It looks like this has been resolved, but please do not be a stranger; if you need my assistance, please let me know and I'll be happy to lend a hand. :-) Best - 04:37, 7 September 2024 (UTC)

Hi @Oshwah, sorry if I was very frustrated with nobody looking into the affair at first. If you still want to help, could you please take a look at the CU log in the days (and maybe even weeks) prior to my ban. It would be interesting to know if this truly was the only time CheckUser was run on my account, or whether there was some fishing to get the false positive result. This could then either mean that (a) a user WP:STEALTHCANVASSED dozens of different admins with SPIs on random other puppet masters they know to have lived in Germany too, or worse, (b) that there was some actual admin misconduct. Biohistorian15 (talk) 09:17, 7 September 2024 (UTC)

Biohistorian15 - No apologies are needed. ;-) Being tagged and blocked as a sockpuppet would of course be very frustrating if you've done nothing wrong. For... well, obvious reasons (lol), I cannot share the CheckUser log publicly, but I'll absolutely review it and (if needed) ask for answers from the team and anyone directly involved. Speaking on behalf of the CU team, I can 100% safely say that none of us want to do anything to cause the community trust issues or concerns with anyone who has funcionary user rights here. Since everything that CheckUsers and Oversighters do is completely behind the scenes and is not public (even to administrators), I cannot stress that or emphansize that enough. In the meantime, if you have questions or concerns, let me know. I'll take a look at things this weekend. :-) Cheers - ~Oshwah~^{(talk) (contribs)} 10:23, 7 September 2024 (UTC)

Mz7 comments

I was not the checkuser that ran the check which led to your block, but today I decided to run a check. I was specifically interested in the JamesOldstone account that claimed to be Oldstone James here earlier [41]. I discovered that that account is  Confirmed to Rhosnes, and those two accounts (Rhosnes and JamesOldstone) are  Unrelated to you. I've posted some more details here: Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Oldstone James#01 September 2024. As I stated there, I'm not sure what to think here. The two likeliest theories in my mind are:

1. Rhosnes/JamesOldstone are truly sockpuppets of Oldstone James, and Biohistorian15 is not, or
2. Biohistorian15 is a sockpuppet of Oldstone James, and Rhosnes is someone else who created the JamesOldstone account to pretend to be Oldstone James.

@ScottishFinnishRadish: Is there any chance you could revisit this and look at the Rhosnes (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki) account to see if you have a view on which of the two theories is more likely? Mz7 (talk) 01:56, 1 September 2024 (UTC)

@Mz7, thanks for responding. I had been made aware of this sock puppet some time after my ban, but saw no reason for throwing somebody else under the bus if nobody cared either way. I had basically given up on an unblock just yesterday...

If you or ScottishFinnishRadish review my user contributions again, it should be very clear that I and Oldstone James (such as most recently: Rhosnes) are simply not the same person.

At last, I do not understand how anybody would have possibly had the stamina for option (2.); I don't get it. Biohistorian15 (talk) 10:07, 1 September 2024 (UTC)

From the summary at SPI, it seems that Biohistorian15 is blocked as a sockpuppet of Oldstone James, and Rhosnes also is blocked as a sockpuppet of Oldstone James, even though IP data shows Biohistorian15 and Rhosnes are not the same person. If I understand the situation accurately, it isn't reasonable to block both accounts for that reason. Biohistorian15 and Rhosnes can't both be Oldstone James if they are two separate people. 2A02:FE1:7191:F500:1D68:AEEA:EBA5:D751 (talk) 18:53, 1 September 2024 (UTC)

It is indeed likely that I'll get unblocked eventually, although the acting admin in my ban – who has, however, not answered any of my emails before – seems to have had a very urgent message for MZ7 some 30 minutes after their statement above.[42] I predict that the additional reasons he may have come up with for upholding my ban will not prove persuasive, and that I'll instead soon after get retroactively banned for some of the mistakes I have made in the last few months as the new user I actually am (e.g. inadvertent canvassing, unduly open accusations of POV pushing ...); oh, the irony. Biohistorian15 (talk) 19:12, 1 September 2024 (UTC)

Thanks for lifting the block, ScottishFinnishRadish. This was a difficult case, and I want to extend my apologies as well to Biohistorian15 for their negative experience here. I do want to address something I think is important: contrary to what Oldstone James claimed, I genuinely don't believe anyone here is trying to act cabal-like and engage in "silencing dissenting perspectives". I think the original block was a reasonable decision based on the information that was known at the time, but after new information was brought to light (the Rhosnes and JamesOldstone accounts) that was not known at the time of the block, we realized we made a mistake, and we fixed it. I hope that we can assume good faith on the part of everyone involved. Mz7 (talk) 06:11, 2 September 2024 (UTC)

@Mz7, a heartfelt thank you for investing all this time into the matter. If I could ask for one thing to improve regarding the conduct of ScottishFinnishRadish - and I am sure many others in his situation before -, it would be to at least try refuting or discussing the (in retrospective) ridiculous amount of evidence I produced in my unblock request. I spent like 50 hours on this; SFR perhaps ten minutes. Further:

• Instead of engaging much, SFR replied with statements like more than one somewhat snarky "go for it" when pinging him with some question.
• He also basically pulled WP:CIR on me when invoking WP:BEANS.
• When I misinterpreted the nature of the CU evidence against me across multiple comments and edit summaries the first 2+ weeks, he also did not correct my assumptions at all. I had to first become a veritable expert on these policies instead. He did this even though it clearly meant that I was spamming CUs with requests to review evidence they couldn't possibly still have access to given the 90-day privacy policy.
• I would be glad if some general aspects of the "behavioral evidence" SFR had, could be unveiled. The m:Ombuds Commission directly told me that it was not "private information", so I think it should have been fully provided in the context of a standard SPI filing.

I think this is still a matter to be very skeptical about. just imagine one left-leaning admin conducts 999 textbook admin actions, and then bans 1 of the most productive right-leaning users without adequate evidence. If it hadn't been for this miracle of sorts, it would have stuck too. If that was even remotely the case, my ~7000 mostly reasonable (global) edits in the last 6 months should really have afforded me a lot more care...

As to the evidence he could have possibly had access to/relied on, I can think of these options:

• Merely the 2021 sock puppet's Berlin IP address(es).
  • I haven't personally been to Berlin in a decade though; not even close.
• Overlap in "user agents" that CUs apparently have access to as well.
  • But then I use the most standard setup ever, hardly a very characteristic one...

I am now deeply insecure about being banned and having much of my content deleted all over again. Biohistorian15 (talk) 06:41, 2 September 2024 (UTC)

He also basically pulled WP:CIR on me when invoking WP:BEANS No, it was a reference to the fact that, if you tell a sock the specific reason why they were identified, they may take your advice and not do that, which would make identifying future socks harder. (Or at least that's what I understood it to mean.) _WADroughtOfVowels^P 08:57, 2 September 2024 (UTC)

As stated in my comments to your criticisms above,[43] I have no idea why a wholly new WP editor like yourself would be invoking complex rules, templates and, somehow, care so very much about my unblock request. Strange coincidences abound here... So very strange. Biohistorian15 (talk) 09:53, 2 September 2024 (UTC)

Saying ...a wholly new WP editor like yourself... is somewhat strange, considering the fact that I have been here for over a year.

As for the ...invoking complex rules [and] templates... part, I do not recall invoking complex rules, and I read the documentation for the templates I use. If you are however referring to my explanation above, I got it from a discussion about Icewhiz, wherein someone asked why they didn't have an LTA page yet.

Also, your claim that I care so very much about this unblock request is quite odd, considering I had only commented thrice before this comment of yours. _WADroughtOfVowels^P 11:52, 2 September 2024 (UTC)

I still don't get it. How would you even have found this talk page, dude? Did you randomly open [[Category:Requests for unblock]] and decided to intervene in a highly controversial case? Biohistorian15 (talk) 11:59, 2 September 2024 (UTC)

How would you even have found this talk page, dude? Simple, I was looking at the history of some article (I don't remember which), and I thought I recognized your username and went on your talk page. _WADroughtOfVowels^P 12:07, 2 September 2024 (UTC)

Ok, I guess. You should still be aware that your contributions are some of the most suspicious editing I've ever seen, haha. What can I say. Biohistorian15 (talk) 12:10, 2 September 2024 (UTC)

Congrats on persisting! I do think that your editing interests/the presumed sock's history have a lot to do with the initial decision not giving you the benefit of the doubt. I encourage you to spend your time making constructive edits to the project, rather than mulling/ruminating. (AHHH I have to run, my class starts in 22 minutes) Mason (talk) 12:39, 2 September 2024 (UTC)

Thank you Mason, have a great day today! You did sincerely answer to my queries, and I appreciate it. I'll probably drop the whole thing soon and return to normality. Biohistorian15 (talk) 12:52, 2 September 2024 (UTC)

I made it with about 30 seconds to spare! Also, my intent with my comment on rumination was that although there are advantageous to figuring out what lead to the chain of events that resulted in you being blocked, self care and engaging with the actual project will probably make you feel more engaged in the project/connected with the community. (I say this based on my exhausting experience with Mathsci (talk · contribs) that really ruined my experience for a while.) Mason (talk) 23:03, 2 September 2024 (UTC)