Misplaced Pages

Revision as of 03:03, 23 May 2009

Evidence presented by Sciurinæ

I have already asked via email to Jpgordon for CU in late March, who replied that CU data was "useless" and recommended a content-analysis although he said he had no time for that. I suggest not to forget that "CheckUser is not magic wiki pixie dust. Almost all queries about IPs will be because two editors were behaving the same way or an editor was behaving in a way that appears suggestive of possible disruption. An editing pattern match is the important thing; the IP match is really just extra evidence (or not)." That's also what the SPI template suggest. It took Molobo a brushed-away case of sockpuppetry () to figure out about IP matches anyway. But that chance was missed because it was too late. For more evidence, also of former sockpuppets, please contact me.

Article evidence

Here is the article-related evidence I can submit publicly (for the rest, please contact me):

• Naming issues: Molobo liked to remove the German name for cities. So does Gwinndeith:

• Fewer real expellees: Molobo and Gwinndeith dislike the high number of German expellees and emphasise colonists in the number.

• ZGV website: Long ago Molobo tried to find fault with a circa 20,000-word article of a web page and included his personal criticism into a Misplaced Pages article. He was simply unable to find a source criticizing the website. Now there's Gwinndeith attempting to put in almost the same criticism without a secondary source again.

• Stauffenberg: Molobo claims that to Stauffenberg "the Poles feel at best under the whip". According to Gwinndeith, now, it needed to be stated that Stauffenberg said "The Poles are a people feeling at best under the whip". He changes it again in the next edit. After that Molobo couldn't hold back Stauffenberg-bashing and sums up this thought on Stauffenberg towards Poles that he "was quite in agreement that they are to be enslaved" even though the topic was unrelated.

• "Strategic bombing during World War II": Molobo has his edits ( ) be restored by Gwinndeith regardless of his 1R sanction. 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6

• Nationality of a Silesian duchess: Molobo also insists that her name in Polish should be added. Gwinndeith removed "German" after it was added.

• 12th-century grievances with the Germans: Molobo inserted the label "German" to century-old crimes. After that had been changed to "Imperial", Gwinndeith changed it back.

• Edelman's criticism: After including his personal criticism, Molobo cited "Marel Edelman the last living leader of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising". He corrects the spelling mistake in the name (Marek instead of Marel). Now Gwinndeith cites "Marek Edelman the last living survivor of Warsaw Ghetto Uprising". He also misspelled the name as "Marel Edelman" in the first edit summary.

The Gwinndeith account evaded for editing and evading 1R sanction. A single POV-tag he reverted four times: 0, 1, 2, 3, 4. That's not just a minor transgression of the 1RR he's on. It was later followed by another 6 reverts on another page in a week, several on one day: 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. Gwinndeith should be blocked indefinitely and Molobo for at least for one month for this. Sciurinæ (talk) 09:04, 19 May 2009 (UTC)

Comment

The evidence presented by Sciurinæ is not complete. Today, I sent the full evidence to Jayvdb, an ArbCom member and a trusted member of our community, and he forwarded it to the Arbitration Committee. AdjustShift (talk) 13:09, 19 May 2009 (UTC)

Note: I'll be closing this case on 24 May 2009. I'm analyzing this case very carefully. I've analyzed Molobo's edits carefully. I've also analyzed past disputes such as Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/Eastern European disputes. The evidence provided by Sciurinæ is strong, and I would like to thank him for his work. Other editors can give their input below. AdjustShift (talk) 15:00, 19 May 2009 (UTC)

Can the above pieces of evidence be numbered so that it is easier to refer to them in the comments?

Overall though most of these criticism describe what A LOT of Polish editors do (sometimes rightly sometimes wrongly). I myself have 1) removed (or flipped) German names when they were in violation of the Gdansk/Danzig vote, 2) questioned the number of expellees as claimed by Erika S., 3) restored text which was removed w/o explanation from strategic bombing/Wielun articles, 4) added Polish name to articles on historical personages of "ambiguous" ethnicity which some have tried to forcibly Germanize, 5) edited articles on "century old" German crimes in ways that some German editors objected to (I can't remember if I ever did anything with Glogow, but certainly some others), and probably cited Marel ... ooops, that "l" key is awfully close to the "k" key ... Edelman as "last living survivor of Warsaw Ghetto Uprising" (that phrasing is quite common in both Polish and English media).

In fact, if someone claimed that I was a sock puppet of Molobo I think similar evidence could be gathered and interpreted in support of that contention. Now, I'm pretty sure I'm not a sock puppet of Molobo - baring mind control or something - and you can run whatever check users or whatever you want on that. So the "strength" of the above evidence is pretty superficial. Basically the evidence presented above proves that ... both Molobo and Gwinndeith are Polish!

The only "stronger" piece is on Stauffenberg basically because that's a bit more obscure (I think?). But even there the evidence is far from conclusive and the reason both editors are inserting similarly worded text is simply because they are both inserting a QUOTE. Actually the fact that they insert two different versions of the same quote seems be evidence contra the sock puppet accusation.radek (talk) 17:45, 19 May 2009 (UTC)

I`m not an expert in this but I thought that the strong evidence would be a little stronger than that....this looks more like speculation...just my 3 cents.--Jacurek (talk) 05:38, 20 May 2009 (UTC)

@Jacurek: I understand that the bulk of the evidence was submitted confidentially and will be interpreted and decided upon by an impartial admin. This is not a vote or even a discussion. --Thorsten1 (talk) 09:37, 20 May 2009 (UTC)

Yes but that is the problem - the secrecy involved. If the evidence that is shown is superficial and trumped up why should anyone be confident that the 'secret evidence' is not? Maybe I wasn't clear enough above. I can see how a ... uninvolved ... admin (i.e. unfamiliar editor) would construe the above correlation between Molobo's and Gwinndeith's edits as evidence for sock puppetry. But as the kids says these days "correlation is not causation", particularly when there is a compelling other reason which explains it - the common nationality of both users. How do we know that the wrong conclusion, based on superficial correlation isn't being made based on the secret evidence? (Note that this not questioning anyone's good faith)

As to whether this is a discussion, it does say "Other editors can give their input below".radek (talk) 10:07, 20 May 2009 (UTC)

I'm just curious if the other evidence are similar to the above speculations and if they will really make admin. job easier. I think that the above evidence/speculations are open for interpretation too much and may be explained in many different ways such as that both editors are Polish for example. Is there any other way? Check the geographical location of the both IP's, log in times or something like that? This would be the real evidence. I just don't want to see both users (if they are two different people of course) and especially Molobo who is so knowledgeable about WW2/Polish-German relations and who was so helpful to me in the past, to be unjustly banned. That is all.--Jacurek (talk) 20:34, 20 May 2009 (UTC)

@Radeksz: "that is the problem - the secrecy involved" - it's standard practice in all sorts of investigations to hold back part of the evidence in order not to compromise the investigation. There's nothing wrong with this. "How do we know that the wrong conclusion, isn't being made based on the secret evidence?" Of course, if the admin dealing with this case decides to sanction anyone, the evidence has to be made public afterwards, so that complaints can be made; if not, there's no need to make it public as nobody will have any reason to complain. As for "correlation is not causation" - of course not, but alas, we can't establish causation except by observing correlation. It's for the admin to decide if the correlation justifies the assumption of causation or not, and I'm sure he or she will grant Molobo the due benefit of doubt, so you really needn't worry.

Finally, a word about the argument "It's just because he's Polish" that's coming up in both Radeksz's and Jacurek's comments: I'd warn against ascribing Molobo's kind of POV-pushing to the Polish people as a whole, or even just the Polish community on Misplaced Pages (which, granted, tends to be more "patriotic" than the average Pole). That's bordering on spreading anti-Polish prejudice (even if the opposite is intended). If Molobo was really just presenting common Polish POVs (and found himself discriminated against because of it, as is implied), you'd have a hard time explaining why they blocked him many times on .pl, too (for reasons like "aggressive and provocative edit summaries", "trolling, edit war, vandalism", "edit wars, repeat offender" ). Also, for those who happen to understand Polish, a look at Molobo's user talk on .pl might help put in perspective the notion that he is only representing common and legitimate Polish views. --Thorsten1 (talk) 09:20, 21 May 2009 (UTC)

Thorsten, well, if the evidence is made public after a decision is made and can be examined and challenged then that'd be good - though really it should be made public somewhere between the execution of the investigation and the rendering of the decision so that the challenges and input can have impact upon it (it's harder to win an appeal once somebody made up their mind). In all of this I am really concerned that these kinds of secret evidence based investigations and non transparent decision making set a really bad precedent (in addition to widening the gulf between admins and regular users).

As to Molobo's POV, from your examples it doesn't seem like the content of his edits is a problem - most Polish editors would agree with them to a large extent - it's how he makes them. And even that needs to be qualified due to the fact that he edits controversial pages which often lead to edit wars even among editors with the best of intentions.radek (talk) 14:16, 21 May 2009 (UTC)

Radek: To clarify, I think the material should be made public only if Molobo ends up being sanctioned because of it. Even if the admin decides its not sufficient to base sanctions on, this does not constitute acquittal. Therefore, the evidence should not be made public in order not to prevent its use in any future procedure. Does it set a bad precedent? I'm tempted to agree. However, the question is, what is doing more harm to Misplaced Pages as a whole - this, or giving users like Molobo carte blanche? I guess we disagree as to which is the lesser of the two evils. "it doesn't seem like the content of his edits is a problem - it's how he makes them." I would say it's exactly the other way round. "most Polish editors would agree with them to a large extent -". If this is so, it doesn't speak well for most Polish editors. --Thorsten1 (talk) 14:50, 21 May 2009 (UTC)

<--This isn't really a place to discuss the content of Molobo's edits (rather than style), but I was just basing that opinion on the nature of his block log and the discussion on his pl talk page.radek (talk) 14:57, 21 May 2009 (UTC)

Sure. But all this proves is that it's easier to get yourself blocked because of the form than because of contents of your edits. It doesn't prove there's nothing wrong with the contents, as you imply. --Thorsten1 (talk) 15:22, 21 May 2009 (UTC)

But the point is that it doesn't prove there is anything wrong with the contents. That's sort of the running problem here - there seems to be a pervasive presumption of guilt on more than one account; no evidence of innocence in edit content so the edits must be bad; no public evidence of sock puppetry so the secret evidence must be damning. That's inadvertently setting two bad precedents not just one. I understand full well that Wiki isn't a courtroom, but the reason that presumption of innocence and the right to address evidence presented against oneself are part and parcel of every decent legal system in the world is precisely because they make good procedural sense.radek (talk) 20:11, 21 May 2009 (UTC)

Radek: The present procedure is strictly concerned with the formal issue of whether Gwinndeith is Molobo's sockpuppet or not. You're right that whoever gets to make the decision should start from the assumption of innocence and sanction only if there's reasonable evidence against this assumption. But since we are talking about contents - yes, I think there is everything wrong with the contents of Molobo's edits. On the project page, you conceded "I really don't know who this user is and only seen her/him in a few places (I haven't had that much interaction with Molobo either". In you favor, I assume that this is why you seem to be unaware of the problem. --Thorsten1 (talk) 21:06, 21 May 2009 (UTC)

The circumstantial evidence provided so far is pointing to far more than just a Polish nationality: it points to a distinct kind of personality not to be found in most Polish editors active here. I agree with Thorsten1 on that. Yet, though it is pretty obvious by the editing pattern of the Gwinndeith account that it is most certainly a sockpuppet, it is likely, but not 100% sure that the puppeteer is the same person operating the Molobo account. From the evidence forwarded by me alone, this conclusion would be too hasty. That's why I put it here for investigation, and the input of additional evidence certainly increased the level of likelihood. I agree with Radek and Jacurek that all the public evidence here is an indication, but not a proof. Skäpperöd (talk) 17:42, 21 May 2009 (UTC)

Confidential evidence

As I understood Sciurinae, the evidence is not made public because it would certainly be abused as a "Manual for the most vicious puppeteer - How to get away with socking". If this is true, the evidence should be kept private, and we should rely on the impartial judgement of the investigating admins. If the evidence does not reveal more than an average potential sockpuppeteer knows anyway, than it should be made public. Skäpperöd (talk) 17:42, 21 May 2009 (UTC)

It is true; that's why Sciurinae hasn't published them. Sciurinae worries that if he publishes the confidential evidences, he may not be able figure out future sockpuppets of Molobo. I've analyzed the confidential evidences, and they are pretty convincing. AdjustShift (talk) 18:45, 21 May 2009 (UTC)

Convincing how? Convincing in the same way that supposedly the evidence presented above is convincing or (hopefully) convincing in a better way? Is there any guideline/precedent/rule/suggestion that addresses this kind of secret examination of evidence without the ability of the accused or other editors to be able to see and/or comment on it? I understand Sciurinae's concerns but I don't quite understand why it is automatically presupposed that these concerns are to outweight basic issues of procedural fairness.radek (talk) 03:03, 23 May 2009 (UTC)