BU Rob13, from IP to Admin in 13 months

[Kumioko]

There hasn't been nearly enough discussion about this shady admin so I am going to start this off in the hopes that others will continue to expand on this. There has been something bugging me about this guy for a while now and I believe they are almost certainly a sock of someone who has edited before, possibly even someone with previous admin experience.

His very first edits reflect an advanced knowledge of Wikipedia policy and ability that isn't inherent in a brand new user. Shown at the bottom of his contributions here: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?ti ... t=BU+Rob13

- First off, from his first edit, they automatically became a high output editor, doing more than 1000 edits in their first month of editing alone.
- No evidence of questions,no warnings for not knowing the rules and no apparent lack of understanding of Wikicraft
- First edit in June 2015 to vote on a Templates for discussion with a sound reasoning that reflects an understanding of Wikipedia policy beyond that of a newby
- a few edits later, Modifications to templates that no newby would do or even know how to do
- Still in the first 50 edits, he starts dropping templates for notability of articles and warnings to vandals
- Within the first month, warning vandals, using twinkle, requesting protection of articles, working on templates, working the stuff for deletion boards, etc.
- A quick glance at the permissions logs here: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special%3ALog&type=rights&user=&page=User%3ABU+Rob13&year=&month=-1&tagfilter=&subtype= shows a steady accumulation of "hats" until they received Admin 9 July 2016...almost exactly 13 month from their first edit.
- Most recently they have been involved in commenting on Arbcom cases and became a member of the Bot Approvals Group (BAG) upon their own request, basically taking Magioladitis' place after he suggested Magioladitis quit.
- etc.

Individually these things would be no big deal but from the very first edits his pattern reflects someone who is planning their Wiki career and no doubt they plan to run for Arbcom if they haven't already or more. This is not someone who should be trusted and there is absolutely more to this character than meets the eye.

[Kumioko]

Someone just pointed me to this link as well on the subject. https://www.reddit.com/r/WikiInAction/comments/4qwrfa/bu_rob13s_rfa_is_this_really_his_first_account/

[Graaf Statler]

This is something I have seen often. (sysop, arbcom member) I think it's OK for the overlords of Pedia when someone changes from time to time his identity. And I understand you are upset what happend to your friend, but Wikipedia is based on the principe of the Infinite monkey theorem. If as many as posible wikipediaens are hitting the keys of a keyboard at random, at the end there will be a perfect encyclopedia. And this is not meant to be funny, this is the way they are thinking. Serious. It's the inclusionism way of thinking of the majority on Wikipedia.

[Kumioko]

Changing Identities is fine if they state that they did it somewhere. No one needs to know what it was, just a statement saying it existed and they changed it. That is not the case here, they have repeatedly denied having a previous account even though it's existence is rather obvious. That is not just me stating that either. As I read more, it has been mentioned multiple times, on their RFA, on their BOT request, etc. There are no less than 5 instances of people questioning them about it and somehow they have still managed to fool people into believing they actually were a new user.

[Graaf Statler]

The same with Natuur12. He denies it, there was a discussion about it. But, WMF don't care. There philosophy is, we don't intervene in the communities, make a chaos as big as you want, and at random, at the end Wikipedia will be a masterpiece. And this is really, really the philosophy of the free source movement.

[Kumioko]

Yeah my fear is that they have a bigger goal...like getting access to the Checkuser data or the arbcom info...the critic in me hopes they do and then leak it.

[Graaf Statler]

O, absolute, that's clear, there is a bigger goal. But they don't care! Because, far, far behind the horizon is that at random ultimate goal! In this crazy way they are thinking, Kumioko. Flip compare it with believe, a sect and he is right.

[Kumioko]

Yeah I would say the Wiki culture is very close to a cult that's for sure.

[Flip Flopped]

Wonder if he's aiming for bureaucrat. He actually expects people to believe he's a new user? Kumi, if he edited some other wiki, would he know how to do all that stuff on Wikipedia?

[Kumioko]

Wonder if he's aiming for bureaucrat. He actually expects people to believe he's a new user? Kumi, if he edited some other wiki, would he know how to do all that stuff on Wikipedia?

Yes it would certainly help to know wiki syntax and some basic HTML but Wikipedia's processes like the stuff for deletion boards and the use of the warning templates is pretty unique and requires some time to learn. Not that long mind you, but not likely to be figured out in the first month.