[Foundation-l] Global ban - poetlister?

[MZMcBride]

Kirill Lokshin wrote:
> On Fri, Jun 3, 2011 at 6:41 PM, Dan Rosenthal <swatjester at gmail.com> wrote:
>> On Jun 3, 2011, at 8:29 AM, Scott MacDonald wrote:
>>> Imagine if poetlister now engages in identity theft and deception at
>>> Wikiversity.
>> 
>> How precisely does one engage in identity theft in a project that does not
>> require the submission of identifying information?
> 
> By voluntarily submitting stolen information, of course.  The fact that
> Wikipedia (or Wikiversity) does not require that I provide my real name to
> participate would not make it any more acceptable if I were to claim that I
> was Dan Rosenthal and put pictures of you on my user page to prove it.
> 
> (You'd be correct if the project actually prohibited the submission
> of identifying information, rather than merely not requiring it; but that's
> not the case here.)

Well, I'm certainly not going to miss a chance to link to
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Internet,_nobody_knows_you%27re_a_dog>.

If your name turned out to not be "Kirill Lokshin," it wouldn't make the
slightest bit of difference to me or almost anyone else. What you're
describing (broadly) reminds me more of Essjay than Poetlister, though, for
what it's worth. I'm not saying that this type of behavior is desirable or
acceptable, but getting back to the point (which should be actionable
behavior), <http://en.wikiversity.org/wiki/User:Poetlister> doesn't seem
very inaccurate or deceptive to me in its current form.

Put me in the "still failing to see a problem that needs solving" column. If
Poetlister is engaging in identity theft, by all means, tell the local
authorities. If he's committing any kind of crime, tell them, for that
matter. But at the moment, he seems to be updating a Bible bibliography on a
free content ... whatever it is that Wikiversity is ("open educational
resource"?). Where's the beef?

MZMcBride