Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Webcomics/Workshop/Meatpuppets

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Moved from Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Webcomics/Workshop to Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Webcomics/Workshop/Meatpuppets during refactoring. --Tony Sidaway|Talk 07:25, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Meatpuppets

An issue occurs when non-Wikipedians create new accounts specifically to influence a particular vote or discussion. This is especially common in deletion discussions. These newly created accounts (or anonymous edits) may be friends of a Wikipedian, or may be related in some way to the subject of an article under discussion.

These accounts are not actually sockpuppets, but they are difficult to distinguish from real sockpuppets and are treated similarly. Neither a sockpuppet nor a brand-new, single-purpose account holder is a member of the Wikipedia community. The reason behind this is, for instance, that an article about an online community should not be kept merely because all members of that community show up to vote for it. The Arbitration Committee has ruled that, for the purpose of dispute resolution, when there is uncertainty whether a party is one user with sockpuppets or several users with similar editing habits they may be treated as one user with sockpuppets.

Comment by Arbitrators:

1. In my opinion: I don't think the AC is in a position to judge how this applies in practice to AfD. It is at the discretion of the closing admin and should continue to be. If there is significant evidence that an admin has consistently gone aginst community feedback on closings, that is. Still, we're not looking at the supposed meatpuppets themselves, but on the behavior of the active editors involved. (Please correct me if I'm misinterpreting this.) Mindspillage (spill yours?) 08:18, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

1. From my perspective, at least, you understand perfectly - the issue is not how to count "meatpuppets." It is how to respond civilly, respectably, and in a non newbie-biting way to people who express concern about something. Phil Sandifer 08:23, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

1. Definitely. There is something to be said about giving newbies a bad experience on their first foray into Wiki, thus resulting in them never becoming regular users. Arguments for Deletion are often the first exposure new users have to Wikipedia, and if they are given the impression that they are not welcome, the community spirit is damaged. --Rosicrucian 22:48, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

1. I definitely think that it would be out of place for the ArbCom to set down policy on how closing admins should regard votes by editors who may appear to be meatpuppets. However, it is within ArbCom's ambit to consider whether the way that some new users are treated in AfD may violate "don't bite the newbies"; if we conclude that it does it might be appropriate for us to clarify that, e.g., openly calling a new user who votes on AfD a "meatpuppet" or "sockpuppet" is against policy for violating WP:BITE or WP:AGF. I think that it would be best for the determination that a particular voter is or is not a soc/meatpuppet to be made by the closing admin at the time of closure, and not by random editors running about striking out votes or adding snarky little "(Only has n edits)" in small print after the vote, the former being far more civil than the latter. Kelly Martin (talk) 01:46, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

Comment by parties:

1. Whoa! Are you really suggesting that we should treat meatpuppets on the assumption that they are one user with sockpuppets? Or did you not mean to quote that portion? Phil Sandifer 19:00, 3 December 2005 (UTC)

   Considering that this is from the official policy page WP:SOCK, I think that the official policy is to treat meatpuppets the same way as a single user with many socks. I guess that means the answer to your question is "yes". Sjakkalle (Check!) 08:05, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

   That must be a mistake - there is no way that can be policy - it doesn't even make any sense. Indeed, it's a relatively recent addition to the page, coming in on June 14th. I've asked the person who added it to clarify their intent. All the same, it seems clear that these are most probably different users - has anyone actually suggested they are all the same user? Phil Sandifer 08:14, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

   The most important part is of course the sentence "an article about an online community should not be kept merely because all members of that community show up to vote for it." That is a pretty close analogy to the webcomics debate I think. Sjakkalle (Check!) 08:16, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

Comment by others:

1. I am suggesting that this principle taken from the Wikipedia:Sock puppet page be upheld by the ArbCom. It is relevant to the events of Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Checkerboard Nightmare, on whether Aaron Brenneman's tagging of several votes was good or bad. Sjakkalle (Check!) 08:11, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

• Meatpuppets are definitely an issue on AFD's that the arbcom has to should deal with since in the case of the Checkerboard Nightmare AFD (mentioned abover) an entire online community voted to keep the article solely due to a thread on their site asking them to, I can try to find the link to the thread in my archives if anyone thinks it would be relevant. Jtkiefer^{T | C | @} ---- 21:48, 3 December 2005 (UTC)

• That's not quite accurate. [1] is the Websnark post you're talking about - it does not make any calls to go vote for the article. In fact, it calls for giving up on Wikipedia entirely. Phil Sandifer 21:54, 3 December 2005 (UTC)

• I apologize your quite right that the majority of the discussion was people lobbying to have everyone who read the post to move away from wikipedia and to possibly engage more of their time in comixpedia, however when posted in an outside forum it has bene proven inevitable that meatpuppet voting will occur. 22:03, 3 December 2005 (UTC)

• Indeed - I just think it's important to note that the bulk of Websnark contributors give every appearance of good faith and interest in expanding coverage on the field of webcomics with good and well-written articles. That said, I'm not sure the arbcom is in a position to "rule" on the validity of "meatpuppets" - it seems to me a largely unsettled policy issue that is left to discretion. On the other hand, they ought not be confronted with an assumption of bad faith. Especially when their source is clearly not calling to "flood" Wikipedia or anything of the sort. Phil Sandifer 22:13, 3 December 2005 (UTC)

1. The argument that members with low edit counts should not be listened to is a form of Ad hominem. As long as the arguments made by the so called "Meatpuppets" is rational and based on principles held by the wiki community, that argument should be considered. Also in this case I feel that this principal does not come into play as meany of the people marked as meat puppets had differing edit histories, so there was no uncertainty as to who they where. Dformosa 00:41, 3 December 2005 (UTC)

   Well put - I'd go one step further. Wikipedia exists primarily for its readers. When those readers suddenly show up in open revolt, this is not an occasion to erect the barricades - it's an occasion to try to figure out what you did that got them so mad. Phil Sandifer 19:00, 3 December 2005 (UTC)

• Wikipedia does exist for it's readers yes but not to the point where one group of readers can overhwelm the community and the process. Jtkiefer^{T | C | @} ---- 22:03, 3 December 2005 (UTC)

• Of course - I'm not saying the votes should have been indiscriminately counted. But the wholesale dismissal of outsiders is troubling. Phil Sandifer 22:08, 3 December 2005 (UTC)

Assuming that we are still talking about the Checkerboard Nightmare AFD, I take offense to the inference that I wholly discounted outsiders, I followed standard procedure in terms of discounting votes, which was discounting those with very few edits and IP votes, only after the closing was I informed that I made one or two mistaken discounts and had it been a matter of keeping or deleting based on those two then I would have revisited the AFD. Jtkiefer^{T | C | @} ---- 03:22, 4 December 2005 (UTC)

We are still talking about the Checkerboard Nightmare AfD, but not about your conduct - I disagree with how you counted your close, but we got to the same conclusion (Keep). I do object very strongly to the entire rhetoric and approach Aaron Brenneman used in approaching the Websnark voters. Phil Sandifer 03:33, 4 December 2005 (UTC)

I would consider the population of readers who do not write (lurkers if we borrow from Usenet terminology) as a part of the Wikipedia community. While I would not suggest that people blindly accept input from new members, I do think that they should have an influence in concensus building operations such as VfDs esp where meaningfull arguments have been made. Dformosa 08:17, 4 December 2005 (UTC)

1. I am not suggesting that users with a very low number of edits should simply be ignored. However, almost all of the regular closers of AFD debates are concerned in maintaining the integrity of the AFD process. When a flood of "keep" votes starts turning up on an AFD debate from users with very few edits, it is not at all far-fetched to suspect that something is wrong. A large number of "keep" votes added to a debate because of a posting at a webforum skew the debate unfairly towards "keep". A large number of "delete" votes added because somebody starts campaigning on user-talk pages for "delete" votes skews the debate unfairly towards "delete". These are real problems of the AFD system, and AFD closers are sometimes hard pressed to find ways of mitigating the ill effects of such skewing. We do listen to arguments presented by everyone. If someone argues that the content was unverifiable, and then a newbie editor turns up with some references to show that the content is true, almost all AFD closers listen to it. However, when there are too many votes from very new accounts, the integrity of the AFD debate is brought into question. We are forced to compensate in some way, either by raising or lowering the bar for deletion from the usual two-thirds guideline, or by discounting the votes which look suspicious. It is tricky to do sometimes, sometimes we discount the vote by a new, inexperienced, but sincere contributor, and that is very regrettable. But simply counting all of the votes will make it way to easy to game the system. In the end, articles need to stand or fall on their merits, judged by people who come along on their own accord to read and evaluate it. They should not be allowed to stay simply because someone takes the time to "get the vote out". Sjakkalle (Check!) 07:24, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

   And this is a reasonable point of view. Slapping an offensive box at the top of an AfD and edit counting everybody without context (Thus suggesting that users like User:Eric Burns are newbies) is not, however, what you've described here. Phil Sandifer 08:14, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

   The Guide to Deletion says "Unfortunately, (vandalism aside) such cases are notoriously hard to distinguish from good-faith contributors writing their first article or from anonymous users who finally decide to log in. If someone does point out your light contribution history, please take it in the spirit it was intended - a fact to be weighed by the closing admin, not an attack on the person.". Sjakkalle (Check!) 08:29, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

   User:Eric Burns has been a registered account for over a year. There is no standard by which he is a meatpuppet. Furthermore, as I have said, it is not just the edit counting I object to - the text of Aaron's box, particularly the summarizing of the alleged meatpuppets views as "OMFG Don't delete" is equally, if not more, disturbing. Phil Sandifer 08:38, 5 December 2005 (UTC)