Oh god, here goes Ottava again, Troll or psychopath, you be the judge Options

[Vigilant]

http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Image_...rendum/en/Other

He just can't seem to quit being a giant, throbbing {expletive deleted}.

[Somey]

http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Image_...rendum/en/Other

He just can't seem to quit being a giant, throbbing {expletive deleted}.

Perhaps, but somebody has to argue that position or it would just be an echo chamber in there, right? Assuming you're against filtering, wouldn't you rather the person be him, given his general unpopularity?

Also, are you referring to the whole page, or the argument with 178.201.100.215 in particular? It looks like you're referring to the whole page.

I actually think Ottava makes some fairly sensible points there. Just because you'll never get him to admit there's a slippery slope involved, doesn't mean he's completely wrong about everything else, does it? Unless it's his persistence alone that's bothersome... but y'know, it's Wikipedia, so you'll have that.

[SB_Johnny]

http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Image_...rendum/en/Other

He just can't seem to quit being a giant, throbbing {expletive deleted}.

Perhaps, but somebody has to argue that position or it would just be an echo chamber in there, right? Assuming you're against filtering, wouldn't you rather the person be him, given his general unpopularity?

Ottava's unique gift is to take an otherwise sensible position, blend it with a few hyperbolisms and paranoid rants, then spit it out in a way that makes the otherwise sensible position look at least as crazy as the otherwise nonsensical position he's arguing against. (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/dry.gif)

[Milton Roe]

I actually think Ottava makes some fairly sensible points there. Just because you'll never get him to admit there's a slippery slope involved, doesn't mean he's completely wrong about everything else, does it? Unless it's his persistence alone that's bothersome... but y'know, it's Wikipedia, so you'll have that.

The fundamentalist mindset tends to be characterized by binary Aristotelian thinking. No fuzzy sets. They very often only see black and white and do not recognize shades of grey, and thus (by definition) do not see slippery "slopes." Just cliffs and discontinuities between correct and incorrect, right and wrong, good and bad. Take a rather obvious process like formation of a human baby from a couple of cells and they can tell you EXACTLY when a complete human being appears--POOF--out of the tissue. No brain? Not a problem for a fundie. A Platonic ideal don't need no stinkin' brain.

Children think like this, too, right up to around age ten. In many ways fundies are like narcissists-- they would be normal children, if they WERE children. They have this quality of never growing up to mature "form-ops" (formal operational) thinking. These qualities (selfish, simple, never unreserved in judgement) are endearing and often humorous in animals and kids. In human adults, not so much.

[Milton Roe]

Ottava's unique gift is to take an otherwise sensible position, blend it with a few hyperbolisms and paranoid rants, then spit it out in a way that makes the otherwise sensible position look at least as crazy as the otherwise nonsensical position he's arguing against. (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/dry.gif)

One of the Sleeping Beauty bad-fairy curses, I suppose, along with the small penis. I remains only to figure out what the last good-fairy did, to partly compensate.

"Ah, but the child will be sensitive to poetry..." (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/unsure.gif)

[Kelly Martin]

The fundamentalist mindset tends to be characterized by binary Aristotelian thinking. No fuzzy sets. They very often only see black and white and do not recognize shades of grey, and thus (by definition) do not see slippery "slopes." Just cliffs and discontinuities between correct and incorrect, right and wrong, good and bad. Take a rather obvious process like formation of a human baby from a couple of cells and they can tell you EXACTLY when a complete human being appears--POOF--out of the tissue. No brain? Not a problem for a fundie. A Platonic ideal don't need no stinkin' rain.

Indeed, that is one of the characteristics that the infamous Jost metastudy of conservatism identified. You know, the one that was derided as claiming that conservatism is a mental illness, even though Jost never made that claim. It could just be confirmation bias on my part, but I've noticed that Jost' observations are pretty much entirely correct, with the caveat (which Jost himself noted) that far-left groups sometimes also exhibit the same tendencies.

As to the question posed by the OP, why can't he be both? Trolling is a form of sociopathy, after all.

(Edited to correct spelling of John Jost's name. Sorry.)

[Herschelkrustofsky]

The fundamentalist mindset tends to be characterized by binary Aristotelian thinking. No fuzzy sets. They very often only see black and white and do not recognize shades of grey, and thus (by definition) do not see slippery "slopes." Just cliffs and discontinuities between correct and incorrect, right and wrong, good and bad. Take a rather obvious process like formation of a human baby from a couple of cells and they can tell you EXACTLY when a complete human being appears--POOF--out of the tissue. No brain? Not a problem for a fundie. A Platonic ideal don't need no stinkin' brain.

Plato has nothing to do with it. Unless you rely on Aristotelians for characterizations of Plato's ideas.

[Vigilant]

I am the great and powerful Ottava! You cannot stop meeeee!
AAAaarrrrrgggghhhhh!
http://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?titl...t&oldid=2852879

Whoopsie!
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/WM:RFH#User:Ottava_Rima

You are *such* a tool, Jeffrey. Go finish your *stupid* thesis already.


This ends as it must, with tears and a journey...

[radek]

I am the great and powerful Ottava! You cannot stop meeeee!
AAAaarrrrrgggghhhhh!
http://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?titl...t&oldid=2852879

Whoopsie!
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/WM:RFH#User:Ottava_Rima

You are *such* a tool, Jeffrey. Go finish your *stupid* thesis already.


This ends as it must, with tears and a journey...

Hmm. Take a look at the admin who originally blocked Ottava. Do people who look like that really edit Wikimedia projects?

[thekohser]

Hmm. Take a look at the admin who originally blocked Ottava. Do people who look like that really edit Wikimedia projects?

Are you talking about this babe? No, of course people who look like that have nothing to do with Wikimedia projects.

[A Horse With No Name]

Are you talking about this babe?

(IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/evilgrin.gif) (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/evilgrin.gif) (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/evilgrin.gif)

Is she legal?

[lilburne]

Hmm. Take a look at the admin who originally blocked Ottava. Do people who look like that really edit Wikimedia projects?

Based on commons uploads seems to have the same interests as FT2.

[Vigilant]

Ottava is a strange bird.

http://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?t...&oldid=58075597

And irony is his planetary mineral.

[SB_Johnny]

Ottava is a strange bird.

http://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?t...&oldid=58075597

And irony is his planetary mineral.

Sadly, Netflix doesn't seem to have "The Chronicles of Riddick" available for streaming yet, but at least I can view "The Chronicles of Ottava Rima" for free. (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/laugh.gif)

You seem awfully interested in him though, dear Vigilant. I hope for all of our sakes that you're not considering bearing his children... (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/fear.gif)

[Abd]

I can be grateful I'm blocked on meta at the moment, because I'd be awfully tempted to comment on Ottava's latest.

He's spouting nonsense on a proposal to create an XML import group a rather arcane piece of business. He only has experience with transwiki import, a simple and relatively safe process, because it only can import stuff, the way the wikis are set, from specified WMF wikis. XML import is highly dangerous, but Ottava's arguments that it's not needed are way off.

I ran into a situation where XML import would have done the trick nicely. And I proposed that it be enabled, on Wikiversity. But then I realized just how effing dangerous that tool can be. It should not be available to ordinary administrators. It imports edits, as they are, using user names, as they are, from a file that can be manipulated by the uploader. It could create hundreds of pages in one import. It could add many edits that would look just like they were made by a user, that the user did not make. These edits would then appear in the contributions of that editor, looking the same as any ordinary contributions. Trivial to do. I don't know, however, if all the individual changes are logged, or if the upload is logged as a single event. If the former, it is *slightly* less dangerous, but could still take a mountain of work by a privileged user to undo.

I think this tool (import/upload) is limited to developers, and for quite good reason. But Ottava's "You Are Wrong! You Are Completely Unqualified! There are No Arguments that Can Be Made! " style obscures that issue.

And it gets worse on the Talk page considering Global bans at meta.

The proposals for global bans are highly dangerous to the independence of the individual WMF wikis. It makes meta in to a governing structure for the wikis, moving away from the original, and well-understood, coordinating role for meta. In any case, Ottava is highly exercised to prevent any exceptions from being made, by local wikis, even if a 'crat is involved, to a ban declared at meta, for Poetlister. And he argues in typical Ottava style against anyone who questions the wisdom of this prohibition.

As often happens, Ottava starts out with some semblance of sanity, but even here he can be seen to have missed the point. Nobody is asking for Poetlister to be "unbanned," i.e., for the account to be unlocked. All that is under discussion is whether or not local communities can defeat the operation of the lock, as they can -- without controversy -- the global blacklist or global blocks, essentially may they "opt out" of the global decision, consciously. Ottava really wants to prohibit this.

Seth Finklestein comes in with a civil-libertarian argument, and so Ottava is off and running.

civil libertarians do not support such individuals as Poetlister and [I] gave reasons why. There is a lot of information visible on multiple Wikis of dozens of simultaneous accounts operating off of different identifies from multiple Wikis for the goal of gaining personal information on others. This was happening while applying for admin rights and other such things. The sheer amount of socking, identify theft, etc. has already been made public. How can you need more than that? [[User:Ottava Rima|Ottava Rima]] ([[user talk:Ottava Rima|talk]]) 00:28, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

I've asked Ottava for evidence of the "gaining personal information" claim, which relates to Ottava's charges that Poetlister abused checkuser (as Cato). Given that there is lots of contrary evidence on this, that the checkuser abuse claim was not found in the meta RfC, my question is reasonable, I think. In any case, this is vintage Ottava, a series of sound-bite claims designed to make his "opponent" look as bad as possible. In this case by defaming someone he thinks the opponent is supporting, which isn't the case here.

*goal of gaining personal information ... a vague claim, involving mind-reading. Hey don't we all like to obtain "personal information" in one way or another?

*socking. Yes, Poetlister certainly did a lot of that, it's undeniable. But ... when was the last time? And if socks are partitioned by wiki, what, exactly, is the harm? His old socking involved lots of stuff that was beyond the pale, though sometimes it was actually harmless; if he did harm with votestacking on Wikiquote, for example, it wasn't obvious, I reviewed many of those examples. All he was doing, it looks like, was creating uncontroversial votes, perhaps to inflate the appearance of a second centrist account, well-aligned with the community. Reprehensible, yes, but not as reprehensible as attempts to overturn consensus with socking! Really, just laziness, is how I'd describe it. I'll have to remember this trick, though. Cool. Just don't do anything to be suspected until after checkuser data expires, and be careful to avoid time correlation. If I ever decide to take a sock to admin, this would be a great way to do it. But I could do it better. Follow the voting of a number of established editors, instead of your own. Just rubber-stamp them with a few acronym comments, you know, "per BigTimeUser, plus [[WP:XYZ]]." Whatever. Efficient. How to Make Friends and Influence People. Agree with them.

And if anyone asks you, noticing a pattern, you say, "Why, of course! I follow BigTimeUser's contributions and check out what he says. This guy really knows his stuff! Got a problem with that?" If you are lucky, they will checkuser you and BigTimeUser. Friends for life, you will be. He knows you and he were falsely accused.

*identity theft. That's a crime, you know. Poetlister did some, ah, unfortunate stuff, reprehensible -- and apologized for it, taking a real-world risk by doing so. But identity theft he did not do. It's possible it's been done to him, there is some stuff floating around in wikihistory that was probably an imposter pretending to be him. That's identity theft. Pretending to be another real person. Not creating a fantasy identity and "fooling" people into believing you. His use of an image without the permission of the person photographed, that was quite possibly a civil tort, but was not identity theft because he did not pretend to be her, the real person. There is no way he could have been prosecuted for identity theft. So this comment by Ottava (which has also been made by many people much more responsible than Ottava) is libel. And who cares? Not those watching and guarding the WMF against hosting libel, eh? (To be sure, Poetlister probably has not made a formal complaint. If he did, and this stuff was left up, he'd have a cause of action at law *against the WMF,* which certainly has deeper pockets than poor Ottava.)

All this stuff happened years ago. There are no claims backed by any credible evidence that Poetlister's harmless contributions at Wikiversity are harming anyone. The most cogent claim would be that his ability to use email there allows him to then send "deceptive emails," though those emails would all be identified as coming from ... Poetlister. And he could do that anyway, it can't be stopped, if he's willing to create socks. In fact, the implementation of the global ban is through a global lock, which does not shut off email. In other words, all that the lock actually does is to prevent him from openly editing as Poetlister, thus leaving an IP trail for checkuser. If he were really dangerous, one would want him to be openly editing in a place where no harm is done. So that his IP would be visible. He's skilled, and probably has taken precautions -- he was a checkuser, after all -- but all it takes is one slip. If he's doing anything reprehensible.

It gets worse.

[Abd]

Hint: this is not about Poetlister. it's about the independence of the wikis, and Poetlister is being used as a poster boy for global control. It's quite obvious that if protection were the goal, this would be handled quite differently.

Ottava continues, becoming stronger in his attack on Seth, using escalating descriptions of Poetlister behavior.

Civil libertarians are against people lying about their identity, infiltrating a database with personal information, and then using it to harm those people. No matter what you say, no one actually would support such action. So any claims about any ideology or groups falls flat. Merely making up a claim no one believes and trying to attribute it to a group without any basis isn't sound logical reasoning. [[User:Ottava Rima|Ottava Rima]] ([[user talk:Ottava Rima|talk]]) 01:47, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

Ottava continues to miss the point, while arguing ever more strongly. Seth is not arguing for an unban of Poetlister, he's arguing for the dangers of strict global bans, decided at meta, which then are interpreted to control what the local wikis can and cannot do. Many users (though it might not be a majority) are quite aware of just how dangerous this is. For starters, because of the huge and often highly-motivated Wikipedia user base, this would demolish the independence of the other wikis. This will happen, almost certainly, what's been seen so far is the tip of the iceberg.

"I do not support any such actions you list" - as I said, no one does. Thus, there is no reason to even assume that it would ever be worth while discussing an unban of Poetlister. [[User:Ottava Rima|Ottava Rima]] ([[user talk:Ottava Rima|talk]]) 02:36, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

Again, as far as I've seen, nobody has proposed a global "unban." Indeed, one of the unworkable proposals being considered is an idea that if a local wiki wants to allow a globally banned user to edit, they should be required to see and obtain an unlock. Which then, if the user is considered dangerous, would expose "unsuspecting wikis" to the user through SUL. Rather, a local wiki can, presently -- there is precedent with Thekohser and others -- decide to allow the user to edit there, and they do it by either renaming to delink the account from SUL, or by allowing a declared sock to edit (or, it's happened, by allowing an undeclared sock to edit, but disclosed to admins or 'crats or checkusers on the site). This creates practically no hazard to other sites and does not require a disruptive and often highly-contentious process at meta.

Ottava added:

And it is silly to say that he can just do it under a new name. He has always operated multiple accounts while pretending one is acting acceptably. You do not unblock because of that. That is like saying if you put a drug king pin in jail and he continues to run his operation from behind jail that we might as well let him out. There is no logic to what you are claiming and it is utterly absurd. [[User:Ottava Rima|Ottava Rima]] ([[user talk:Ottava Rima|talk]]) 02:36, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

And then he gets more personal with Seth:

Seth, it has already been demonstrated that 1. you aren't part of the community, 2. that you don't know Poetlister's background, and 3. that you admit that you don't support his actions. That means that your words are empty and serve no purpose. So why continue? And if you are saying this is like jailing on drug dealer of a large operation, then good. Not being able to get all criminals is not an excuse not to lock away any criminals. Not being able to do everything is not an excuse to do nothing. That is one of the worst logical fallacies. [[User:Ottava Rima|Ottava Rima]] ([[user talk:Ottava Rima|talk]]) 03:34, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

This is so rich! The discussion is not of unbanning Poetlister. It is of global ban process. But, in fact, the major example before people's minds, it's rather obvious, is Poetlister, the whole topic was raised because of Poetlister. Ottava's involved because of Poetlister. The same principles being asserted in these discussions could easily, and might be, applied to Ottava himself. Ottava, though, doesn't care about that, all he really cares about is going after one of his favorite targets: Poetlister. If involvement with Wikiversity (which is what he means by "community") is necessary, then there is no ban of Poetlister. The RfC had, as I recall, two persons from Wikiversity who commented. (Besides Ottava? I forget). There was myself, opposing the ban, based on review of evidence and the likely effect, plus the global considerations involved with global bans, and SB Johnny, who was pretty neutral.

It's a common Ottava ploy to assert that someone he's debating with has no right to comment. Ottava is, above, revealing his concept of bans as punishment. He's not at all concerned about protection, really. Real police, concerned with actual protection, rather than "instant justice," often leave drug dealers -- and even terrorists! -- at large, because they can watch them. Ottava wants "justice." I.e., he wants to see the Bad People punished, and Poetlister is a very handy Bad Person.

[http://en.wikiversity.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/Seth_Finkelstein You have no edits at Wikiversity]. You have no right to dispute the point that you are not part of the community. Your trying to do so verifies that there is disruption and not proper behavior. You need to stop. [[User:Ottava Rima|Ottava Rima]] ([[user talk:Ottava Rima|talk]]) 14:57, 6 November 2011 (UTC) (diff)

The question was about Poetlister on Wikiversity and how to handle that. You even acknowledged that a few times. Your feigning difference now when it is obvious that you no longer have an argument is a little unsettling. You overreached, you lost, and now you continue. [[User:Ottava Rima|Ottava Rima]] ([[user talk:Ottava Rima|talk]]) 19:26, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

This is, again, classic Ottava. When he's really gone out on a limb, he then "closes" with a claim that "You lost." That, by the way, is a classic way to troll for more outraged comment.

Look, all you idiots at Wikipedia Review think Poetlister is Evil Personified. Well, you lost! Stop lying!

This actually works with idiots. I wonder if any will bite. Someday, ask me to tell the story of the "Ignant Brothers," I heard it from inmates at San Quentin. One thing I'll point out: dealt for years with real criminals, actual murderers, felons. I don't get terribly exercised by Bad Editors -- unless I've drunk too much Wiki Kool-Aid, it rots the brain and one starts to become awfully imbalanced. OMG! They've lied about cold fusion! Call the Police! Strategic Air Command! REALLY, THIS IS SERIOUS! The future of the planet depends on this!

Seth nails it.

The issues here are about global bans, and Poetlister's case is cited as an example. Your formulation would restrict people able to comment on meta to only those who are active contributors on Wikiversity, which is not appropriate. Note, your persistent baiting of me reflects badly on you. -- [[User:Seth Finkelstein|Seth Finkelstein]] 19:54, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

'Nuff said. I predict that Ottava is history within at most a few weeks. He's on his last life at meta, I doubt that if he's blocked again, he'll find anyone willing to touch it.

[EricBarbour]

tl;dr

(sorry Jeff)

[SB_Johnny]

tl;dr

(sorry Jeff)

Me too.

[Abd]

tl;dr

(sorry Jeff)

Me too.

You fully deserve that headache, SBJ. It's going to get worse before it gets better, sorry to say. You get what you pay for.

[tarantino]

Hmm. Take a look at the admin who originally blocked Ottava. Do people who look like that really edit Wikimedia projects?

Are you talking about this babe? No, of course people who look like that have nothing to do with Wikimedia projects.

Her blogger profile pic is also quite lovely. Who would have guessed she's a theologian?

http://www.blogger.com/profile/13132702039138562947

The gentleman who took that picture, A Brazilian pastor named Christian Bitencourt, seemed quite enamored with her at the time.

Lest someone get the idea that User:Béria is actually some middle-aged statistician who appropriated that photo, there are others of her attending meetups.