Tim Starling wrote:
Perl is a user who has been obssessed with sysopship and other forms of status since shortly after he joined Wikipedia. He makes many good contributions under one name, and applies for sysopship, and then when his bad reputation starts catching up with him, he switches names and tries again. So far he has done this 4 times. He has contributed as Aplank, Greenmountainboy, Sennheiser, NASA and Perl.
I might add that I have had a rather insightful talk with him about it and from it I gained the impression that he has now come to understand the inappropriateness of sock puppets and has agreed to stop reincarnating. I believe him this, and I also believe that his previous actions were - from his point of view - in good faith (I know this is difficult to appreciate for some). I have the strong impression that he never meant to hurt anyone's feelings or to make anyone feel cheated or deceived, and it seems to me that he now understands that this is what he has caused, and so he stopped.
I also believe that if he had been granted adminship, he would only have applied the privileges in good faith (he certainly never caused any damange on the Maori Wikipedia or Wikibooks). Nevertheless, of course, in the light of the circumstances, it is difficult to trust his good faith, which is why I voted against him in the hope that he wouldn't view it as hostility against him.
I hope this shed some light on his motives and intentions; I think he's a really nice guy, and he doesn't deserve being badmouthed for his actions or being accused of being deliberately disruptive. This doesn't mean I'm defending his actions, but I think he just needs a little bit of social guidance, if you see what I mean. I am certainly glad that he is still around, and I'm sure he will continue to make valuable contributions in the future.
Greetings, Timwi