Timeline for Can sock puppets be used to curate more content?

Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0

14 events

when toggle format	what		by	license	comment
Feb 20, 2021 at 2:08	vote	accept	cigien
Feb 19, 2021 at 8:18	comment	added	cigien		@MartijnPieters Yes, I'm definitely biased by my thinking it would be beneficial, and that my intentions are good. I see your point that it should be counted as abuse, thanks. I'll wait a bit to see if anyone else wants to write an answer stating that clearly, and I'll accept that one. (minor point: I wasn't sure it's not abusive, hence the Meta post before doing it).
Feb 19, 2021 at 8:13	comment	added	Martijn Pieters		@cigien You don’t think it is abusive because you feel you have a noble cause. That doesn’t mean that we agree however. The limits exist in part because by the time you hit those limits people tend to loose perspective. Using a sock to continue reviewing anyway is, in my view, abuse. No matter how much you think it would be helpful.
Feb 19, 2021 at 7:41	comment	added	cigien		@yivi Yes, looking at it as "bypassing system limitations" certainly makes it much clearer that this is unlikely to be allowed.
Feb 19, 2021 at 7:38	comment	added	yivi		I think it's obviously that plain and simple for the use-case you propose, @cigien. Put it another way, what you propose sits clearly in the "bypassing system limitations" category, which none of the suggested valid use-cases is an example of.
Feb 19, 2021 at 7:34	comment	added	cigien		@yivi I understand completely if this would count as abuse, but it's obviously not as plain and simple as "if the second account allows you to do something on the site that your normal account would be prevented from doing, it is abuse." If that were the case, then there wouldn't be a list of valid uses. Note that all those valid uses are things that can't be done from the normal account. The distinction (the reason they're allowed) is that they're not abusive.
Feb 19, 2021 at 7:29	comment	added	yivi		@cigien It doesn't get simpler than "it the second account would allow you to do something your normal account would be prevented from doing, it's abuse". Bypassing voting limits or review limits or flag limits (etc) would mean the second account would do things the first account was preventing from doing. It's abuse, plain and simple.
Feb 19, 2021 at 7:20	comment	added	cigien		This is an interesting answer: I understand that it would be hard to audit whether anything problematic is going on (voting on the same posts, etc), but that doesn't seem to be a reason to outright prohibit it. Of course, it would make sense to ban it if this were a common practice, but I think that would be unlikely.
Feb 19, 2021 at 7:14	comment	added	cigien		@animuson Yes, I'm quite aware of why the limits exist, and there are very good reasons for that. I'm also aware that these limits must be chosen in a way that works for the largest number of users. There are many users for which these rates are way higher than necessary, and some for which it's a bit low. Also, I'm not sure that many users would go to the effort of building up a bunch of rep just to be able to cast more close/reopen votes.
Feb 19, 2021 at 7:13	history	edited	GlorfindelMod	CC BY-SA 4.0	added 196 characters in body
Feb 19, 2021 at 7:11	comment	added	animuson StaffMod		Think of it another way: the limits exist for a reason. If we thought that it was ok for you to continue reviewing just with a different account, why have the limits in the first place? Perhaps research why the limits exist and you'll understand why it would be seen as abusive?
Feb 19, 2021 at 7:06	history	edited	GlorfindelMod	CC BY-SA 4.0	added 193 characters in body
Feb 19, 2021 at 7:02	comment	added	cigien		Well, I linked to that post in my question, and the text you quoted actually says "A good rule of thumb for identifying abusive* socks is: if the second account ...". (emphasis mine). That's my question really: is the behavior I'm asking about in fact abusive*?
Feb 19, 2021 at 7:00	history	answered	GlorfindelMod	CC BY-SA 4.0