2 questions about Wee Bairn banning

[Tamerlane]

@Rubystreak

Where did he brag about having socks at all?

Huh. See to me, “multiple e-mails to mess with people” more or less strongly implies sockpuppetry and is close enough for government work ( and I’m a government worker ). Is it the strict definition? Well, no, it’s not. But it is in the same genus. To me it’s the same level of pedantry as parsing between “hacker” and “cracker.” Now obviously I’ve got nothing against pedants, being one of those as well, but I don’t really find tom’s comments that egregiously erroneous. At least to me it’s obvious what he meant.

Personally I don’t particularly mind inoffensive sockpuppets - say an account someone uses for extra community anonymity to ask outre questions or for embarrassing advice. Again, not a strict definition of sockpuppet, just a multiple accounts never used for genuine “sockpuppetry.” But it’s against the rules and thems the breaks.

And if anyone cares to investigate me, they will find me in complete compliance ;).

[mhendo]

@PunditLisa

I really do try not to feed trolls because I understand that they are deliberately acting prickish in order to get attention. Giving attention to these sorts only encourages them to continue acting prickish.

However, I don’t agree that releasing sock names is the equivalent of feeding trolls. Quite the contrary. There are some legitimate reasons why releasing the names has merit:

1. It adds credibility to the banning. I’m not a conspiracy nut, but some people on the boards really do think that the Mods have it out for some people. By providing the list of socks, it proves that the Mods have, indeed, found concrete evidence against the poster and removes the air of suspicion that some people have about the Mods’ true agendas.

2. It would actually discourage people from creating socks - The SDMB equivalent of mounting their collective heads on the gate coming into town. I seriously doubt WeeBairn anticipated that he’d ever be banned AND outed. That’s a deterrent for anyone else considering doing such a thing.

3. It satisfies our curiosity - I don’t think I have a “right” to know, but I’m glad that Giraffe released the names. If I was so inspired, I could now do searches to see if any of the socks showed up in contentious threads to lend support to the Puppetmaster. There’s something particularly pathetic about that.

I agree with all of this.

Also, as some of the Mods themselves have admitted, this was a rather unusual instance of sock banning, in that the person concerned had been a member for an extended period of time, and had accumulated a large number of posts. This was not some fly-by-night guest who put together a few accounts just to troll the boards.

Like him or hate him, Wee Bairn was a member of this board for quite a while, and his name was instantly recognizable to most members. I know that i had interacted with him in numerous threads, and had a very clear sense about how i viewed him as a poster. When someone who has been this central to so many board discussions is banned, i think it’s reasonable to want to know who his socks are.

If some other long-term user, known to everyone (like, say, elucidator, or Bricker, or ivylass) were found to have multiple accounts, i would like to know the identities of those sock puppets. If, on the other hand, the socks are from some recently-joined guest who is just trolling, i have no problem with not knowing the identities.

[MandaJo]

My god. This whole thing is a perfect example of how semantics can derail a debate. Is a “sock” a false identity created on the internet in order to fuck with people or is it a false identity created on an internet message board to fuck with people?

[Omegaman]

@Atomicktom

Wee Bairn is banned?

So is it okay to like Oprah now?

Yes, you can admire her pubilcly now. No more bashing for that.

[Omegaman]

@rayh

No, I understood it too, which is why I didn’t dump on the mods.

I am definitely going to need a cite for this.

THERE IS NO CITE!!! ABANDON ALL HOPE YE WHO ENTER HERE!!!

RUN!!! RUN FOR YOUR LIVES!!! THE END IS NIGH!!!

[flurb]

@Manda JO

My god. This whole thing is a perfect example of how semantics can derail a debate. Is a “sock” a false identity created on the internet in order to fuck with people or is it a false identity created on an internet message board to fuck with people?

Bingo. Just coming to this debate now, it seems that the whole issue behind the veracity of **tomndeb’s **statement is that he considers a false Hotmail account to be a “sock,” and **Rubystreak **and crowd do not consider the “sock” to be created until the false account registers on a message board. Until the OED decides to settle the matter, I would hope that reasonable people could recognize that two people are simply operating under different definitions of a “sock”.

[Rhythmdvl]

@Colibri

Sock Apocalypse!

Asockalypse Now

[rayh]

@flurb

I would hope that reasonable people could recognize that two people are simply operating under different definitions of a “sock”.

Which message board you on?

[Frylock]

@Squink

Every once in a while, you FIND the WMD’s.

-FrL-

[Sam_Stone]

Jesus, you people. Get a life!

It looks pretty simple to me. Wee Bairn says he has on occasion created fake e-mail accounts, not for innocuous reasons, but to jerk other people around. A mod thinks, “Hmm, I wonder if he does that with accounts here?” and looks. And finds a bunch. User is banned, as per the rules.

It sounds like some of you are trying to make a civil rights case out of this. The mod didn’t have enough evidence! It was a witch hunt! He never said he was a sock! You didn’t have probable cause to look! Waaaa!

It’s a private message board. A mod can do as much mining in the database as he feels like doing, for any reason, at any time. That’s life.

As for releasing sock names, consider this: A user logs on, and is around for months or years. People in the user’s real life know who he or she is on the board. One day this user wants to ask questions about how to end an affair, so the user creates a sock to ask the question, so that the spouse doesn’t find out. Sock is discovered, user is banned. Do you think it would really be smart to let the community know who the sock was? Do you think that might not open the SDMB up to legal action if disclosing that information led to a divorce?

I fully understand the desire to know whether the person you’ve been chatting with for weeks or months is a sock. I also understand that when people do create socks, often it’s not just to yank people around, but to say/do things they do not want associated with themselves, perhaps for serious personal reasons (create a sock to diss the boss, because the boss uses the SDMB and you can’t let the boss figure out you’re the one dissing her. Sock is revealed. Poster is fired. Lawsuits ensue).

In any event, it’s just not that big a deal. The mods are volunteers, and shouldn’t have to put up with this amount of abuse and crap over every routine activity. Lighten up!

Oh, and I would fully understand if a mod thought to himself right about now, “Hmm… Sam Stone sure has given a lot of thought to this idea of using a sock to ask personally embarrassing questions… I wonder if he’s done that?” and then goes digging. That’s okay with me.

[Loach]

Cisco should be banned for starting this abomination.

[DudleyGarrett]

Quick, mods, search Sam Stone’s IP address! I think he had an affair! (that’s a good logical leap, huh?)

This way we can end his time at SDMB AND his marriage!

Good times.

[Frylock]

@Frank

Serious question, really. What does that gain for you?

I imagine it’s a bit eerie to think that what you thought were two different people turn out to have been the same person. I can see that one would want to sort of relive the interactions, to sort of work through it.

-FrL-

[Bricker]

@Q.E.D.

That’s twice now you’ve followed me into a Pit thread and dropped an unprovoked steaming load. If this is your new hobby, I suggest a new one. Otherwise, one might get the impression that you are a childish, petty and mean-spirited little man.

How the fuck would I “follow you” into a Pit Thread, you moron? By posting subsequent to your first posting in it? Or do you imagine that I am somehow tracing your every move, ready to jump into a thread only because you’re in it?

No. Rest assured that my commentary on your idiocy was sparked solely by your demonstration of it in this thread. If it should happen that you make a solid argument in the next thread I “follow you into” I will be more than willing to acknowledge it as such, most probably with fulsome praise.

I admit that your recent posting history makes this a fond but faint hope, but I believe in redemption.

And – just for my own edification, so I might know the club I’ve apparently joined… how many people now have this utterly unfounded and irrational dislike of you? Is it just me? Just me and Giraffe? At what point do you ask yourself, “If it’s one person then I can say they’re crazy, but with X people doing it, maybe I’m doing something I should change?” Is X 2? 10? No number at all, because you are Perfection Itself?

Just wondering.

[Marley23]

@Eureka

Now, I understand the bit about mods being able to look for evidence of sock-puppetry without any evidence whatsoever–and his attitude that everyone does it is certainly suspect–but I was shocked by how quickly he was banned.

It really wasn’t that fast. He made his comments at 10 a.m., I made my search about two hours later, found the proof, asked for Mod thoughts, waited an hour for comments and banned him around 1:30. Seems fast to you, maybe, but it was quite slow to me.

@elbows

Seriously though, Marley 23 started this by implying that he/her was banned for a veiled reference to behaviour on another site.

I never implied Wee Bairn was banned for a veiled reference to behavior on hotmail. I said his post implied that he had “sock accounts,” meaning socks on this board - nobody gives a crap about how many email accounts Dopers have elsewhere - and that that was later confirmed, at which time he was banned. I really think the most reasonable way to read that post is “Wee Bairn implied he had socks here, we found he did, so we banned him.” In the future I’ll try to be more explicity, but frankly I don’t know how people came to some of the conclusions they came to. The rules about sock accounts are very clear and they’ve never been interpreted to mean multiple email addresses or behavior at other sites.

I did make a mistake in assuming there would be a Pit thread asking for more details almost immediately after the banning, because I would have been at my keyboard and able to provide the information I’ve given here. Instead, you guys waited eight hours, until I went out to a party.

[Sam_Stone]

@DudleyGarrett

Quick, mods, search Sam Stone’s IP address! I think he had an affair! (that’s a good logical leap, huh?)

This way we can end his time at SDMB AND his marriage!

Good times.

Heh. I actually tried to amend my message and say, “I realize that saying this means some mod might decide to scour the database to see if I’ve done that. More power to them.” But I ran out of my five-minute window.

[Q.E.D]

@Bricker

And – just for my own edification, so I might know the club I’ve apparently joined… how many people now have this utterly unfounded and irrational dislike of you?

I have no idea. I don’t particularly care; however, if the number of times we’ve each been pitted is to be any guide, you’ve got me beat there by a considerable margin.

And that’s all the response you’re getting out me, you pompous ass.

[Sam_Stone]

@Marley23

I did make a mistake in assuming there would be a Pit thread asking for more details almost immediately after the banning, because I would have been at my keyboard and able to provide the information I’ve given here. Instead, you guys waited eight hours, until I went out to a party.

WHAT??? Mods have banning parties? How insulting! I’m outraged. AND, you admit that you make assumptions about posters. You’re like the bloody Gestapo!

<removing tongue from cheek>

[chique]

@Frank

It’s high enough to exclude you.

BWAHA!

That is the funniest thing I’ve read all week. High five! :D:D

[rayh]

@Sam Stone

Mods have banning parties?

Some party if they only manage to ban one person. The hookers and blow must have run out real early.