Stephen Bain wrote:
On 6/16/07, Blu Aardvark jeffrey.latham@gmail.com wrote:
Why then, are we making a big deal over an outdated policy page on meta that clearly is not supported by practice, policy, or basic common sense on the English Wikipedia?
Because the original problem - the inability to identify sockpuppets editing from such proxies - remains.
So since some puppeteers might abuse proxies, nobody can use them at all. Always the hallmark of a poor policy.
What if we instead said, "If we suspect you're a sockpuppet and checkuser reveals you're using an open proxy, you're identified"? (That is, what if we declared, by fiat, that we *could* identify sockpuppets editing from such proxies?) This would mean that the "punishment" for using an open proxy would then be the possibility of being falsely accused as a sockpuppet, instead of today's "violating policy with every edit you make" and possible capricious derailment of RfA.
Would this hypothetical shift in policy reduce our ability to identify sockpuppets, or otherwise harm the project in any way?