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Wikipedia:Suspected sock puppets/Nrswanson

{{sspa}}

=[[User:Nrswanson]]=

;Suspected sockpuppeteer

{{user5|1=Nrswanson}}

;Suspected sockpuppets

{{user5|1=Ringnpassagio}}

{{user5|1=Voicequeen}}

;Report submission by

edg ☺ ☭ 04:41, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

;Evidence

Both socks are new accounts who edit war in favor of fork articles (and a template) recently created by Nrswanson in voice/opera related topics, including Discussion page conversation and deletion discussions for these pages. Voicequeen in particular has very few edits, and no interest outside Nrswanson's disputes. Nrswanson's method appears to be creating parallel versions of existing articles, then attempting to delete the existing versions. Why this is done is unclear, but it evades WP:CONSENSUS in the existing articles, and violates WP:OWN.

Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser/Case/Nrswanson considers this Possible sockpuppetry, but cannot rule out multiple users of the same public wireless node, and propose "It's most likely that they are known to each other, rather than being the same person".

1) Voice type hijack attempt

Nrswanson establishes a consensus with the two new accounts to delete Voice type ("and do not merge")[http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Voice_type&diff=prev&oldid=181017127] in favor of the Nrswanson-written Voice classification. Ringnpassagio (in this editor's 5th & 6th ever edits) promptly deletes comments from Talk:Voice type, copy/pasting to Talk:Voice classification (a discussion page that prior had only comments from Nrswanson and puppets.[http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Voice_classification&oldid=180941191])

Voicequeen twice reverts information merged to Voice type from Nrswanson's fork article, with edit summaries accusing bad faith

[http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Voice_type&diff=180882662&oldid=180862338] [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Voice_type&diff=180885426&oldid=180882682], helping Nrswanson evade WP:3RR. Nrswanson's reversions on same article: [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Voice_type&diff=180830436&oldid=180804437] [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Voice_type&diff=180861537&oldid=180848512]. Nrswanson's initial deletion: [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Voice_type&diff=176361159&oldid=175355437].

2) New account edit history

Day-old account Ringnpassagio also creates a template on [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Template:Vocal_registration&oldid=181030926 2007-12-30T19:15:18], 2 hours after claiming to have never used Wikipedia before [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Opera&diff=181008226&oldid=180816295 2007-12-30T17:09:12].

3) Talk:Falsetto edit warring

Ringnpassagio and Voicequeen help Nrswanson edit war in Falsetto register. Nrswanson rewrote Falsetto register (previously a redirect to Falsetto) and created a bad-faith Afd for the Falsetto article: Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Falsetto

Upon being rebuked in this AFD (Speedy keep)[http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Falsetto&diff=180797999&oldid=180796721], Nrswanson begins Talk page campaign to instead redirect Falsetto to his article. New accounts Ringnpassagio and Voicequeen agree most enthusiasticly. [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Falsetto&diff=180876214&oldid=180860794] [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Falsetto&diff=180940343&oldid=180876214] All three casually ignore the decision made in the Afd.

Nrswanson begins edit-warring on the Falsetto register redirect, continuing to revive his version. Day-old account Ringnpassagio contributes to the revived page, making sophisticated edits (such as adding a template [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Falsetto_register&diff=181031512&oldid=181028771]) and when redirect is restored, reverts with edit summaries accusing the redirector of bad faith,[http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Falsetto_register&diff=prev&oldid=181080275] and canvasses a WikiProject for support on Nrswanson's issue. [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Opera&diff=181082822&oldid=181074782] [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Opera&diff=181087798&oldid=181083522] (Ringnpassagio templates an article relevant to one of Nrswanson's issues for this WikiProject[http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Voice_type&diff=prev&oldid=181024228] prior to joining this WikiProject [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Opera&diff=prev&oldid=181024998].)

The Potemkin village on-wiki consensus-building demonstrated on Talk:Falsetto register [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Falsetto_register&oldid=180940613] seems especially improbable considering Nrswanson's later claim that these people are friends of his who correspond via email [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:Ddxc&diff=180951045&oldid=180746913].

4) Sock similarities

  • Similar biographies. [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User:Voicequeen&oldid=180878831] [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User:Ringnpassagio&oldid=180939692] Biographies identify geographically distant residences, despite Checkuser finding use of same WAP (Nrswanson: Oklahoma; Ringnpassagio: NYC; Voicequeen: unspecified, but implies elsewhere).
  • Both contribute to Voice type,[http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Voice_type&offset=20071230181222&limit=20&action=history] an article heavily edited (and arguably WP:OWNed) by Nrswanson[http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Voice_type&diff=175923792&oldid=175191286 diff] [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Voice_type&offset=20071205141609&action=history history]. (Note edit by Ringnpassagio deleting almost all article content.[http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Voice_type&diff=prev&oldid=181018394])

5) Votestacking in {{Tl|Vocal classification}} Tfd

All three accounts vote Keep in a Tfd for Nrswanson's 2 day old[http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Template:Vocal_classification&diff=180748915&oldid=180690438] fork of {{Tl|Vocal range}}, created to replace an existing template. Nrswanson [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Templates_for_deletion/Log/2007_December_29&diff=180828929&oldid=180828797]; socks [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Templates_for_deletion/Log/2007_December_29&diff=180941662&oldid=180938787] [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Templates_for_deletion/Log/2007_December_29&diff=180938787&oldid=180913187]. Interestingly, Ringnpassagio makes a show of independence later in the discussion, changing Keep vote,[http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Templates_for_deletion/Log/2007_December_29&diff=181015782&oldid=180948064]

but continuing to argue for Nrswanson's other pages.

6) Style similarities (added by Ddxc (talk) at 00:16, 2 January 2008 (UTC))

On [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Falsetto&oldid=181160272#Merger_with_falsetto_register_page Talk:Falsetto#18.1] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:Ddxc&oldid=181096157#Accusation_of_sock_puppets_false User talk:Ddxc#8 - 10] you can see that all three users use similar (slightly cumbersome) sentence structures. Also, they have a similar density of punctuation and spelling mistakes, and they sign the same way. (Nrswanson [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:Ddxc&oldid=181229033#Accusation_of_sock_puppets_false wrote] that the two other users are meat-puppets, but because of the aforementioned stylistic evidence I don't believe him, and I'd consider them sock-puppets for all practical purposes.)

;Comments

  • Comment from Voceditenore Preliminary Note: I have never edited the articles in question, although I am a member of the Wikipedia Opera Project which has an interest in articles on voice and singing. This issue was brought to our attention on the project talk page. Note that in the deletion discussion, I voted to keep Falsetto. I don't believe User:Ringnpassagio and User:Voicequeen are sockpuppets, but that should be easy for admins to check via looking at their ISPs. Their edits are sophisticated because they are all voice teachers and have all studied voice and vocal performance - two of them are also teachers. The fact that their biographies are similar is also not surprising if they are all in the same line of work and probably at one point studied in the same institution. They do seem to be friends whom User:Nrswanson, specifically recruited into the 'fray', something which he has admitted himself. That is highly frowned on by Wikipedia and was ill-advised. Their expertise is welcome, but at the very least, they should have made the circumstances of their participation clear on the talk pages of the relevant articles. Had they done so much of this unpleasantness could have been avoided. I also have views on what should be done about the conflict between the two articles, but I shall put that on Talk:Falsetto. Voceditenore (talk) 06:45, 31 December 2007 (UTC)
  • One of Ringnpassagio's edits was to create a Template. I don't think using Wikitext is routinely covered in voice and vocal performance education. / edg ☺ ☭ 07:02, 31 December 2007 (UTC)
  • No it's not routinely covered ;-) But he could be technically savvy anyway and it's quite possible to create a template by modifying an existing one on a related article e.g. Template:Vocal range. I figured out how do that quite quickly when I first started editing on Wikipedia, and I am not technically savvy at all. In any case, User:Nrswanson has never created templates before and often asks for help on technical questions far simpler than creating templates. Like I said, I don't think the three editors above were acting in bad faith, but their approach was most ill advised and could have been avoided had they read this before they embarked. Best, Voceditenore (talk) 08:37, 31 December 2007 (UTC)
  • For the record, Nrswanson [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Template%3AVocal_classification&diff=180748915&oldid=180690438 created] the {{Tl|Vocal classification}} template. / edg ☺ ☭ 20:34, 31 December 2007 (UTC)
  • As the checkuser who ran this case, can I just state that I strongly suspect collusion here due to the addresses used and the timings involved. I am 100% certain that these people know each other - Alison ❤ 20:18, 31 December 2007 (UTC)
  • I really doubt much harm is done here. Nrswanson writes very nicely and his friends sound like equally knowledgeable people. Welcome one and welcome all, says I. Moreschi If you've written a quality article... 23:40, 31 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Nrswanson is being disruptive and ignoring WP:CONSENSUS, and his lovely friends are at best meatpuppets who edit war on his behalf with disregard to policy and consensus. As I [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Opera&curid=740743&diff=181287644&oldid=181286899#Edit_war_that_needs_some_help commented] on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Opera, the sneaky and [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/Incidents&diff=181246964&oldid=181246933#Nrswanson_article_hijack_attempts complicated] efforts Nrswanson is making to WP:OWN these articles are not justifiable, and would not be needed if Nrswanson would contribute to the existing articles (presuming there is non-puppet consensus for his edits). / edg ☺ ☭ 23:54, 31 December 2007 (UTC)
  • (I've added another point 6 above.) -- Ddxc (talk) 00:16, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

;Conclusions

If these users aren't socks, they're meatpuppets. I also find the fact that Nrswanson and Voceditenore (who appeared defending them here) both have large gaps in their edit histories that are very close in time very interesting; along with the fact that Ringnpassagio and Voicequeen. The only reason I'm issuing warnings vice blocks is that they all seem to have gone quiet again. Strong warnings issued on all talk pages. If such activity reappears, this case should be referred to. — Rlevse • Talk • 01:21, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

::Interesting followup, see [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk%3AVoceditenore&diff=182926966&oldid=182861187]. — Rlevse • Talk • 10:55, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

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