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Posted by: carbuncle

Remember when Cirt said:

and
Well, that was weeks ago, and in a different calendar year, so I guess it would be unreasonable of me to hold Cirt to those statements. What has Cirt been up to in the first few days of 2011?

• http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Jenna_Miscavige_Hill&diff=prev&oldid=405668060 "KEEP" on Scientology-related deletion discussion for Jenna Miscavige Hill
• http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Exscientologykids.com&diff=prev&oldid=405668091 "KEEP" on Scientology-related deletion discussion for Exscientologykids.com
• http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:MartinPoulter&diff=prev&oldid=405668542 someone for their work on an L Ron Hubbard book article
• http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:SchuminWeb&diff=prev&oldid=405668595 someone for their work on an anti-CoS activist Jenna Miscavige Hill article
• http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Hell_Is_Other_Robots&diff=prev&oldid=405657809 a Futurama episode dealing with "Robotology"
• http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Miles_Fisher&diff=prev&oldid=405657629 the BLP of an actor who did a spoof of Cirt's arch-enemy Tom Cruise
• http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:Lalaland317&diff=prev&oldid=405668257 someone whose only recent edit (out of a total of two) is a supportive comment for Jenna Miscavige Hill on the talk page of their article
• http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Death_of_Philip_Gale&diff=prev&oldid=405656516 a conversation on the talk page of an article about a former Scientologist who committed suicide years after leaving Scientology
• http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Downtown_Medical&diff=prev&oldid=405667882 the renaming of a page about a Scientology-related medical clinic

Just about the only thing that Cirt did that isn't related to CoS is http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Inchon_(film)&diff=prev&oldid=405657529 a removed quote from a movie financed by the Moonies. I'm sure there is nothing wrong with having a highly negative review snippet in its own coloured box:I mean, that's pretty neutral, right? I'm going to add something similar to the Sound of Music and see what kind of reception I get.

Cirt's statements about staying away from CoS stuff seemed to work in that people backed off the ARBSCI enforcement, but if Cirt can't keep away from it by themselves, it may be time for an intervention.

Posted by: Silver seren

...okay, the first two and the last two, yes, but you're really stretching with the rest.

Thanking someone isn't editing articles related to Scientology. Futurama is a major stretch. In the actor's article, his edit had nothing to do with the spoof, but was on an entirely separate part of the article. Welcoming someone is not editing Scientology articles.

Save the first two and the last two, but get rid of the rest, they don't help your argument at all.

As for the Inchon film, the movie was almost completely panned by critics and it is common practice to put a single quote from a critic that generally sums up the rest of the critics' feelings about the film in a box like that, which it does. There's nothing wrong with that edit.

Posted by: carbuncle

I didn't cherry-pick these edits - they make up most of what Cirt has done since returning from a short wikibreak. Cirt didn't edit these articles at random. Even if the edits he made are not directly related to Scientology, that is the reason Cirt was watching them. You don't think thanking people for editing CoS-related articles is at odds with saying "I am going to shift my focus away from this topic of Scientology in general"?

Posted by: taiwopanfob

Cirt says (s)he will "shift focus" away from Scientology. Well, it doesn't appear to have happened. All of the links carbuncle provides is evidence for a "lack of shift". Rather than editing articles on mollusks or something, Cirt is in fact hanging around the Scientology related ones.

It's like a known bank robber hanging around outside a bank; the manager of the bank would be negligent in his duties if he ignored the behavior.

Posted by: lilburne

You http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Sockpuppet_investigations/Shutterbug/Archive#21_December_2010 it helps if one can poison the ground. However, at least one of the CU clerks has caught on to the ruse.

Posted by: thekohser

Best sentence of 2011, thus far!

Posted by: wikieyeay

Given that the episode is a parody of Scientology, is included in the Scientology Portal, etc., it doesn't seem much of a stretch at all.

Posted by: Herschelkrustofsky

Kudos to Carbuncle for the amusing thread title.

Posted by: Infomercial

This man is either a liar or extremely insecure. If both is true, he probably doesn't belong on Wikipedia in the first place.

Or does he...

Posted by: Herschelkrustofsky

Everybody's all worked up about this now. The Resident Anthropologist (any relation to Moulton?) is http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:Will_Beback&oldid=405612544#Two_things about Cirt. And, TRA has withdrawn from WP:Neutrality in Scientology, while http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Neutrality_in_Scientology&oldid=405776744#Participants, evidently in opposition to the basic premise.

Posted by: HRIP7

Note that Scott is http://forums.whyweprotest.net/12-active-projects/wikipedia-editor-proxying-osa-deleting-jenna-miscavige-75541/#post1386709.

Cirt has better press on that forum. Harking back to the affair about the puff pieces for Jeff Stone's opponents in http://forums.whyweprotest.net/26-think-tank/jeff-stones-opponent-ken-dickson-58560/, Kenneth Dickson (T-H-L-K-D) and Joel Anderson (T-H-L-K-D), the same lady http://forums.whyweprotest.net/15-media/esmb-david-miscavige-wikipedia-damage-control-72481/ that she

Posted by: Herschelkrustofsky

I hate to say it, but this is the thanks Scott gets for actually being pro-neutrality.

Posted by: RMHED

No that's what Scott gets for being a naive twat. Maybe one day he'll learn, but I doubt it.

Posted by: Lar

Channeling WMC again?

Posted by: RMHED

That man-made global warming twat?

Now that's just offensive Lar!

Posted by: Somey

Well, I thought he showed admirable initiative by registering on the Why We Protest forum to try to explain his actions WRT the Jenna Miscavige article.

Somehow these Anonymous folks, who clearly have their hearts in the right place, have to try to understand that Wikipedia is the real problem here - it's just too easy to abuse if people aren't paying attention, and what people of conscience hope to prevent here is neither the smearing nor the "sanitization" of Scientology itself, it's the use of what has come to be an Acceptable WP Smear Tactic on people who don't warrant it.

It's similar to what Nobs used to call "ideological profiling" - if certain less-than-ethical WP'ers discover that they can bash people with the "Scientologist" label, just as they've bashed people with various other labels in the past, they're almost certainly going to use it on people who have precious little to do with Scientology, if anything.

If you're going to bring down something like Scientology, you need patience, you need creativity, and you need a damn good plan. What you don't need is people sniping at innocents.

Posted by: carbuncle

[removing my overly long criticism of Anonymous because I don't want to derail my own thread. It's about Cirt.]

Posted by: Jagärdu

Good thing because I noticed there were 2 guests and 1 Anonymous user reading the thread ...

I find little of this surprising, and I hope someone at the very least sets Cirt straight.

Posted by: carbuncle

Cirt doesn't appear to be enjoying the attention this thread may have garnered and is on another short wikibreak. On Wikipedia, that is. On Wikimedia Commons, Cirt has been http://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?limit=50&tagfilter=&title=Special%3AContributions&contribs=user&target=Cirt&namespace=&tagfilter=&year=2011&month=1. They are attempting to have a number of images deleted. Yes, images related to Scientology. You know, that subject form which they were distancing themselves?

I'll quote the reason for deletion and you see if you can figure out what it means:

I think the newspaper of origin may be misidentified (Los Angeles Daily News instead of Los Angeles Times), but what is "the list"?

Posted by: taiwopanfob

Quick research: we have a Los Angeles Daily News (historic) and a Los Angeles Daily News. The latter is still in business, but the former folded in 1954, and merged with Los Angeles Mirror. This last link is to the current Los Angeles Times, which may explain some of the source stuff at:

http://unitproj.library.ucla.edu/dlib/lat/display.cfm?ms=uclalat_1387_b155_52178-5&searchType=subject&subjectID=222501

Whatever this all may explain, it certainly isn't "the list"...

Posted by: HRIP7

Karppinen (T-C-L-K-R-D) recently introduced some early black-and-white pictures of Hubbard's 1950s' Dianetics seminars in a few WP articles. Cirt began the New Year by http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Karppinen#File:L._Ron_Hubbard_in_1950.jpg all of them for deletion in Commons.

Actually, I tell a lie. Cirt's first Commons action in the New Year was to http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Deletion_requests/File:2008_03_15_Anonymous_v_Co$.jpg on http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:2008_03_15_Anonymous_v_Co$.jpg.

Posted by: carbuncle

A mysterious stranger has helpfully cleared up the "list" confusion:


I would guess Karppinen is representing the Church of Scientology in this epic battle between good and evil online spat.

Posted by: Beer me

Resident Anthropologist seems to be http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twelve_Tribes_communities he guards thier page and wrote a glowing article for them. Yet he is concerned about Cirt?

Posted by: Jagärdu

Go figure. Anyone who belongs to a group that might be considered a "cult" by anti-cultists would be concerned about Cirt. Of course anyone interested in neutrality would also be so concerned. At the end of the day, the organizations Cirt has focussed most of his attention on are run by scam artists who have probably ripped off many a lost soul. However, in battling these organizations Cirt has been wreaking havoc on the encyclopedia. At the end of the day the Wiki is worse off for it.

Posted by: tarantino

Resident Anthropologist used to be known as http://www.google.com/search?q=Weaponbb7&hl=en&num=100, before the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/Weaponbb7. http://brehmblog.com/2009/02/another-brehm-alumni-reports-success.html who spend way too much time on wp.

http://news.chattanoogan.com/articles/article_151674.asp he explains his interest in the Twelve Tribes.

Posted by: NuclearWarfare

.

Posted by: Beer me

&num

huh... You know its kinda depressing to see the face behind the account. I thought looking through his contributions I had found the next cult pov pusher member to be banned from wp. Its just some aspie kid...

Posted by: EricBarbour

Finally getting it, yes?

That's the central point.
Wikipedia's culture is so screwed, it makes flaky college kids look like "experts".
Not because they contribute quality--because they play the game obsessively.

Posted by: rebelrouser

On the hunger project Smee welcomes a user that hadn't edited for two years?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/Drzeus

Drzeus. Five edits in 2004 to add the alleged Werner Erhard connection to the HungerProject, two years later it has been removed and Smee adds a section about the alleged connection to werner

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=The_Hunger_Project&diff=next&oldid=54350368

and then welcomes the two year old contributor that has not edited since 2004, what is that about?

She also adds a couple of links to

http://www.carolgiambalvo.com/index.html

Carol Giambalvo’s interest in cults and thought reform began in 1978 when her step-daughter began exhibiting a drastic personality change following becoming a devotee in ISKCON. She began researching cults and thought reform and lectured in local high schools, churches and civic organizations. The more information she gathered on the indoctrination processes and thought reform used in cults, the more concerns arose about her involvement in est and The Hunger Project. In 1983, she and her husband, Noel, left their associations with est, The Hunger Project and Sterling Institute and began a personal search for information to aid their recovery process.

Smee welcomes Affcarol

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Affcarol

Affcarol makes only COI contributions

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/Affcarol

Posted by: Cedric

Welcome to Wikipedia Review, rebelrouser.

Admittedly, what you point out here is rather weird, but then, Wikipedia and weird just naturally go together. Indeed, I can top this. About two months ago, I accidentally happened upon my old user talk page when I intended to access another page. There I found http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:Edeans&diff=prev&oldid=377484841 that had been left for me a few months earlier. The thing was, I hadn't edited WP http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/Edeans, over three years earlier. I don't believe that I had logged in for at least three years, either.

It could be nothing more than inattention, or perhaps some "wikipedians" actually believe WP is like the Hotel California: you can check out anytime you like, but you can never leave.

Posted by: rebelrouser

June 2006 Smee wrote this all about Carol

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Carol_Giambalvo&diff=prev&oldid=59407142

the confusion about Smee is a man or a woman and about lengthy edit sessions is self explained , as she says, "she and her husband, Noel, left their associations with est, The Hunger Project and Sterling Institute and began a personal search for information to aid their recovery process" A husband and wife editing team.

Sterling Institute of Relationship. written by Smee http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Sterling_Institute_of_Relationship&dir=prev&action=history

Carol Giambalvo

http://www.carolgiambalvo.com/index.html

won the Margaret Singer award

Margaret singer page

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margaret_Singer

written by Smee

Posted by: carbuncle

This passage in the WP article International Cultic Studies Association made me laugh:

Posted by: Herschelkrustofsky

As is typically the case, the statement would apply with equal validity to every major religion and political movement.

Posted by: Kelly Martin

You know, I get so sick and tired of Wikipedians coming here and using their idiosyncratic and inane jargon as if it had real meaning. What the fuck are "COI contributions"? Are you really alleging that every last one of this editor's edits exhibits a "conflict of interest"? More generally, what the fuck does a Wikipedian mean when they say "COI contribution"? Surely they're not talking about fish.

Posted by: Herschelkrustofsky

It is not out of the question that Cirt might win this year's WP:DICK of Distinction award. Under the circumstances, can anyone offer credible evidence as to Cirt's gender, or can anyone offer evidence to support the rumor that Cirt is more than one person? IMWTK.

Posted by: Somey

You're saying that Cirt is Noel Giambalvo, or rather both Noel and Carol Giambalvo...? I don't think so. Cirt might be highly familiar with the Giambalvos or even know them personally, but the Giambalvos themselves just don't fit the profile. For one thing, they would realize after a few weeks of Wikipedia activity that they were becoming part of a cult themselves, and get the hell out!

Anyway, interesting speculation, and I hope you don't take my dismissal of it personally. There just has to be another explanation, though like I say you may very well be on the right track (FWIW).

Posted by: Jagärdu

This is most likely http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Affcarol. Interestingly, Cirt (as Smee) is the only editor to have edited her user page - http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User:Affcarol&action=history. There is definitely a familiarity there that extends beyond the Wiki.

Here's another interesting coincidence. Another anti-cult editor who was quite active in the Smee era, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Tanaats, also edited the Giambalvo page. For instance http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Carol_Giambalvo&limit=500&action=history Tanaats picks up just minutes after Smee left off. What is more interesting is that Tanaats seems to have been quite active, until just a couple of months prior to the Smee/Cirt changeover, when he just disappeared into thin air - http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Contributions&limit=500&target=Tanaats. Is it possible that Cirt is both Taanats and Smee? Look at Taanats editing style. Anyone recognize the high volume of minor edits and vandalism reversions that the reformed Smee (aka Cirt) was known for the year before being made an admin? A comparison between Smee/Taanats (in combination) and Cirt might yield some insight. If, and its a big if, this idle speculation is correct it might not be a stretch to think that the new Cirt is a tag team, perhaps even of people *like* Carol and her husband.

Posted by: Kelly Martin

Cirt/Smee being a pseudonym shared by several different people over the years would be consistent with the slight variances in apparent personality and style (not to mention gender) that has been exhibited over the years. Certainly wouldn't be the first case of a cult or cult-like entity using a shared account used by like-minded people for forwarding their shared point of view.

Posted by: carbuncle

As much as Cirt's overt anti-Scientology POV-pushing galls me, I'm not sure that outing them is a great idea if those stories about the CoS harassing their enemies are to be believed.

Posted by: tarantino

http://www.freedomofmind.com/resourcecenter/groups/t/tm/a-house-of-cards-dissociative-bliss-becomes-addictive/. He's in California. All the IPs that Cirt has let slip are far away from there. They could have met on the http://forum.rickross.com/index.php where both were active at the same time.

Posted by: Jagärdu

Well, I don't think anyone has outed anyone else here. Just a bunch of idle speculation. Personally I don't think Cirt is an account utilized by any of the names mentioned in the above thread. That it might be shared between two or more anti-cult activists is all I was suggesting. As pointed out by tarantino Tanaatas is clearly unrelated.

Also, I was under the impression that Cirt had already been threatened off-wiki (implying that someone had figured out who he was) and that this was why the name change happened in the first place. Though clearly anyone who wanted to know would know that Cirt = Smee so I'm not sure what the point was. I've always felt that the name disguise was just gaming the system for a clean start from an unclean account, but then again I've never been privy to any behind the scenes information about this.

Posted by: Lar

Goes without saying that I agree. Nevertheless I said it anyway. What a dick I am.

Posted by: Milton Roe

Agreed, though I doubt very much they are the same person. Smee created the Carol Giambalvo bio (she's a former self-described Erhard cultist) with a lot of refs and info. THEN Smee (as you say) created both Affcarol's userpage AND talk page (both as single edits, which still stand). This was to allow Affcarol (T-C-L-K-R-D) to edit Carol Giambalvo's bio, for Affcarol is a SPA. Clearly, as has been suggested, Affcarol is Carol Giambalvo herself. However, not Smee/Cirt. One has to look at the edits that Affcarol THEN added to her own BLP after Smee had done creating it:

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Carol_Giambalvo&action=historysubmit&diff=59458739&oldid=59407142

A lot of stuff is modified or erased as being outdated. If Smee is using "Affcarol" as a sock account for this purpose, he/she is doing a brilliant job, and a LOT of work adding stuff that the real person then goes and updates. This also seems rather too distant a contact for a husband/wife.

Incidently, where did CoS come in? The Giambalvos got into cult deprogramming via Erhard/EST/Landmark, not CoS, so far as I can tell. Have they branched out subsequently?

As somebody who stands outside this battle, I'm always sourly amused when some people who get sucked into Landmark or CoS, then go on to run "cult awareness" networks from the refuge of Christianity. There do exist some very cult-like Christian groups (in the sense of being isolative, controlling, and involved in all aspects of members' personal lives). And there exist people who seem to need this, like the submissives in dom/sub roles in S&M organizations. In a sense, like so many mental disorders, these is a problem of arrested development-- of children who in one way, never grew up and became full adults.

Some people not only CAN'T think for themselves, they actually don't WANT to think for themselves. It scares them. Causes PTSD and anxiety. If you take these people out of their regimented cult/fundamentalist deeply-organization-controlled lives, even the military/police/Catholic Church, their eyes bulge out and they flop about like fish brought up from the pressurized depths of the ocean. (Hey, Ottava? Isn't that swim bladder bulging out through your mouth sort of uncomfortable?)

One interesting thing is that many very-controlling organizations (think of the Amish or various flavors of Orthodox Jews) seem to exist, in part, to keep OCD people from going crazy. How? By giving them something to do. LOTS of rituals and repetitious work. When such people decompress, they need something ELSE to do. And too often, what they find these days, is a new life editing Wikipedia... And we see some of that in the cult-anticult wars on WP.

Anyway, Cirt/Smee's assistance (indeed handholding) to allow and protect a SPA account in their quest to edit their own bio on WP, is an outstanding example of organizational hypocrisy. Not everybody gets to do that.

Posted by: EricBarbour

Well put. The idea that some people are "born to be slaves" goes all the way back to Aristotle, but usually gets twisted by racial bigots. (Where is William Shockley when we need to abuse him?) But perhaps there is always a percentage of the population, of whatever racial makeup, that needs to belong to a social group, one that forces a false reality down their throats. Without a false reality, they go mad.

Wikipedia, I suspect, will someday be accused of being cultic in its basic nature. The actual operation of it is a hostile and erratic mess, but the Jimbo-luv and "positive energy" that appears whenever the word "Wikipedia" is uttered in mixed nerd company is remarkably similar to the blind rage that Scientologists show when defending Hubbard and Miscavige from their critics. Or Erhard fans (who still exist, though in small numbers), or TM fans, etc.

Posted by: Herschelkrustofsky

we at the Program and Catering Committee have no intention of outing the victorious contestant. We simply need to know whether we ought to refer to the victor as "he", "she", "them", or "it".

Posted by: Wikicrusher2

You must not have remembered http://wikipediareview.com/index.php?showtopic=30245 thread after posting in it (or just felt sullied after the impression, Krusty, as you suggested you did). By the voice it seems pretty obvious that Cirt, being the operator of the account that uploaded the files, is male (unless he got someone else to do it). Either way, Tarantino has http://wikipediareview.com/index.php?showtopic=27899&st=120&p=231471&#entry231471 that Cirt was a guy, and his research is usually quite trustworthy.

For the record, I personally agree that it's not useful to out Cirt, and it certainly doesn't contribute to any criticism of his actions on Wikipedia. Add to that Scientology's record of interaction with its critics being rather, shall I say, dubious, sometimes crossing the line into harassment. Goodness knows, we don't want that happening to Cirt, even if WR is largely not fond of him and/or thinks he is obsessing too much. I'd argue that his opinions of Scientology are correct, and he might have even been a victim of a cult at one time (Erhard's?), so it would be best to try not to become as obsessed over his WP behavior as he is about Scientology. Nevertheless, it seems that he is being overly assertive on labeling people as Scientologists when their connection is not that strong, and the WR threads about this are not unfairly targeting Cirt, IMO.

Posted by: Herschelkrustofsky

I'm with you on that. And for the record, I too think that Scientology sucks. I have met some Scientologists that seemed like decent people, and once one of them persuaded me to read a book by L. Ron Hubbard. It was horrendous, basically putting forward an AI model of human cognition. Their epistemology is crude and soulless.

Posted by: Milton Roe

Why would a guy pick out a name like Smeelgova for themselves? If you know enough Russian to do the end, you're likely to do it right.

Besides, there was something about way SV was sucked into Smee and its hysterics about being in personal danger from the nasty CoS, and the way Cirt skillfully used that. If Cirt's a guy, let's just say he's not likely to win the Cojones de Laton.

Posted by: tarantino

Why would a guy pick out a name like http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Contributions/RachelBrown?


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Requests_for_adminship/Cirt

Posted by: Kelly Martin

I have been at Capricon 31 the past few days (it's local to me so attending is just the price of the badge and the gas to drive there). I got into a heated, drawn out argument with some random guy over Wikipedia in which most of the usual assertions were repeated by the wikidefender. I'm not even sure he was an editor, either; one of the interesting things about Wikipedia-love is that it seems to be held far more widely than merely those who are actively involved in the site.

Then again, I've run into this as well with respect to Disney. I revile Disney, but I've learned that to express this opinion in many contexts is a near-guarantee of a hostile response from someone in the audience. Apparently it's "just wrong" not to like Disney's animated films.

Posted by: Doc glasgow

Disneyland is a work of love. We didn't go into Disneyland just with the idea of making money ---Walt Disney

Now, where have I heard that line before ......?

Posted by: EricBarbour

There are few places better-suited to find guys of that variety than a science-fiction convention.

It's a major component of Wiki-luv: young men with aggressively antisocial tendencies, plus OCD.
Science fiction, fantasy and RPG fandom overlaps very strongly with it.
And no doubt, if you took the time to explain WP's problems to that guy at Capricon in detail,
with examples, he'd probably be just as horrified as Peter D's fellow academics are when he
shows them the harassment he gets when fixing philosophy articles.
Question is, who has that kind of time?

I still think a book, on paper and sold widely, will do more than all the explanation deliverable by
all the WR regulars, when it comes to counteracting the mass cultic Wiki-orgasm. I think it's
a product of general ignorance, rather than deliberate and willful deception.
As you keep saying, Jimbo is a remarkably poor dissembler. He's just been very lucky, so far.

Where were we? Oh yeah, Cirt......

Posted by: It's the blimp, Frank

Do you think Jimbo will have his noggin cryogenically preserved?

Posted by: Somey

The issue at hand seems to be whether or not Mr. Cirt is a "them," as in two or more people. I have to say, this would certainly explain a few things, not least of which is Cirt's tendency to behave as though Cirt has no recollection of previous promises or agreements made by Cirt, and going off and doing things Cirt had previously agreed not to do as if those promises/agreements had never been made - chiefly, trying to tag people as "Scientologists" in their BLPs when they're clearly not, and of course, the spammy puff pieces like the Daryl Wine Bar article.

Obviously we see that sort of thing from Wikipedians all the time, so it's certainly not conclusive, but I think it's a plausible theory in this case... I mean, we've also seen Cirt behave in a rather male-like fashion (aggressive, nit-picky, arrogant) for a period of time, and then behave in a female-like fashion (careful, conciliatory, subtle) for a subsequent period of time, and then back again.

Single accounts used by multiple individuals are probably quite rare, but only because it's exceptionally difficult to attain the level of trust required between the people using the account (since any one of them could go off the reservation at any time and change the password without telling the others). But some sort of anti-cult organization could probably manage it... If the real-world consequences (outside of Wikiland) for any one person taking over the account are serious enough, then it's a much more feasible strategy - after all, more people mean more activity, which leads to adminship much sooner (and more easily).

Posted by: gomi

More likely a part of his anatomy somewhat below that.

Posted by: CharlotteWebb

Surely it would be more advantageous for two individuals to edit as two (or more) user-accounts than as one. But if this really is the prevailing theory, I'm surprised nobody nominated Cirt for Herschel's tag-team event.

Posted by: Detective

I think that's a joke about Disney being frozen. Someone who hated him put it about that he'd had it done "in an attempt to become a warmer-hearted person".

Posted by: Jagärdu

Depends on the advantage you seek. Editing from one account with sysop privileges, and the protection of a core of administrators who think anyone opposed to Cirt might be in league with the evil Scientologists out to get him is certainly an advantage. Also, having multiple people edit from the account that first year, when he was racking up thousands of housekeeping edits and building a new identity would most certainly have been an advantage, if only in the ability to edit in volume.

Posted by: Milton Roe

Cause he's a perverted guy? The difference is that person did it to game the men. Cirt would have been doing it to game the Joan of Arc and Durova-loving... Durova. Nothing says drama like a woman in armor.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Requests_for_adminship/Cirt

Yes. Smeelgova seems almost tailor-made to be pleasing to Durova. http://wikipediareview.com/index.php?showtopic=14011, the mentor of both Moulton and melodramatic Jon/Navou/Mercury/WordMachine/NonvocalScream...

Posted by: CharlotteWebb

No, I really think whatever benefit this affords you would be less than editing from multiple sysop accounts (cf. the Poethorde), even if the second exists as nothing other than contingency if/when arbcom shoots down the first.

Posted by: Milton Roe

No, there's some truth in it. Walt "Tomorrowland" Disney did express interest in being frozen upon death (nobody was freezing heads in 1966, though). Then, as a life-long smoker he got lung cancer on top of his heart disease. His doctors told him he had a chance if they removed one lung (not likely) and he went for it. Three weeks after that operation he had the heart attack that would kill him two weeks after THAT. He really had no time and no energy to be the first guy to be frozen. He had the money, but imagine the legal nightmare if you have THAT much money.

There are people who think that if you merely express your wish to be frozen cryogenically to your family, that they'll actually do it when you're alive. No, here the cynics are right. Families will have somebody who wants to be frozen, instead buried or cremated and be off with the goods and money before the funeral services are even planned (as happened in fact to Disney).

Cryonics started in Michigan as an idea and in New York state as an organization. The California Cryonics Society by accident had its first press conference announcing its existence, on the day Disney died, Dec. 15, 1966. Reporters went from one event to the other (which may have had something to do with the rumors). The first person ever to be frozen for the long-term in this way however, turned out to be a California UC vocational college teacher named James Bedford. He died less than a month after Disney, and was frozen in California. His family fought tooth and nail to get the money he spent on it, but lost. Bedford remains frozen today in Scottsdale, Arizona.

Posted by: tarantino

I, for one, miss http://wikipediareview.com/index.php?showuser=2310.

Posted by: Somey

Thankfully, we can still listen to http://www.emusic.com/album/Lee-Nysted-Whispers-Of-Wisdom-MP3-Download/11080802.html.

Not sure what he's doing these days... He's got a pretty fancy http://www.nystedmusic.com/ which I don't recall him having before, but nothing in the "News" section appears to be newer than 2006.

We're getting a bit off-topic, but I don't suppose that's really anything to be concerned about.