Venezuelan politics Arbcom case

[estecaso]

• Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Venezuelan_politics (T-H-L)

Was following this with some casual interest and recent developments made me think I'd ought to try a first post here. WMrapids (T-C-L) and NoonIcarus (T-C-L) (formerly Jamez42) may be familiar to some in the audience for frequent edit wars on Venezuela articles that perennially show up on ANI, with NoonIcarus in the pro-opposition groups to Venezuelan gov camp and WMrapids in the anti-opposition groups to Venezuelan gov camp to offer the short explanation. I express no strong opinion on the relative merits of each side due to lack of subject knowledge other than gut dubiousness of defenders of the Venezuelan government but a pretty dim view of both of these folks judging by what gets to noticeboards.

A recent ANI thread (link) resulted in a topic ban for NoonIcarus from Venezuelan politics, which drove S Marshall (T-C-L)—who felt this thread, though not entirely meritless, was lopsided and populated mostly by people sympathetic to WMrapids' POV—to request an Arbcom case. For a while after being accepted due to the obvious history of clusterfuck in the area it proceeded mostly in predictable fashion with the Evidence phase being the usual back and forth between NoonIcarus and WMrapids and their respective sympathizers.

Then out of the blue WMrapids was checkuser blocked by Primefac (link). Simón, el Silbón (T-C-L) was similarly blocked a minute before (link), and did also edit a few Venezuelan articles from a similar POV, though that account seemed to focus less specifically on Venezuela. I haven't looked deeply but my quick skim wasn't able to discern a super obvious motive for socking. (NoonIcarus mentioned (link) emailing private information to the Committee after the two blocks occurred.)

(Before this I had wondered a tiny bit about a relationship between the earlier ZiaLater (T-C-L) and WMrapids owing to the shared interest in the same tiny Grand Rapids articles and Venezuela and WMrapids' activity surging three days after ZiaLater disappears. More than this, too; some of the overlap in obscure articles edited is notable, like BAP Almirante Grau (CLM-81) (T-H-L), or certainly Femicides in Peru (T-H-L), which has barely been edited by anyone else but the two. But ZiaLater's perspective tended to be closer to NoonIcarus than WMrapids best I can tell, so I tentatively assume those things are just a really weird coincidence and I'm seeing more than there is. )

[Midsize Jake]

Then out of the blue WMrapids was checkuser blocked by Primefac (link). Simón, el Silbón (T-C-L) was similarly blocked a minute before (link), and did also edit a few Venezuelan articles from a similar POV, though that account seemed to focus less specifically on Venezuela. I haven't looked deeply but my quick skim wasn't able to discern a super obvious motive for socking. (NoonIcarus mentioned (link) emailing private information to the Committee after the two blocks occurred.)

(Before this I had wondered a tiny bit about a relationship between the earlier ZiaLater (T-C-L) and WMrapids owing to the shared interest in the same tiny Grand Rapids articles and Venezuela and WMrapids' activity surging three days after ZiaLater disappears...

It looks to me like the big shift in Mr. WMRapids' activity (from North American subjects to South American ones) occurred in early August 2020 (at the height of the COVID pandemic). Whereas Mr. ZiaLater's quit message was posted on June 14, 2020.

I guess the pandemic changed a lot of things for a lot of people, many of whom were feeling the effects of increased isolation, etc., but still, this all does look a little weird. Almost as if a completely different person took over the account, and I guess it could have been the ZiaLater account-operator, assuming that's what happened. But who knows... I've always suspected that "account handoffs" are a less-rare occurrence than most Wikipedians would prefer to believe, but I wouldn't want to be the one to have to prove that's what happened in any given case, including this one.

[ltbdl]

unless i'm stupid, the sockmaster would also be blocked

[Midsize Jake]

unless i'm stupid, the sockmaster would also be blocked

Call me naïve, but I strongly suspect that if a "sockmaster" account were to be identified in this case, that account would be blocked regardless of your level of intelligence.

[estecaso]

It looks to me like the big shift in Mr. WMRapids' activity (from North American subjects to South American ones) occurred in early August 2020 (at the height of the COVID pandemic). Whereas Mr. ZiaLater's quit message was posted on June 14, 2020.

I guess the pandemic changed a lot of things for a lot of people, many of whom were feeling the effects of increased isolation, etc., but still, this all does look a little weird. Almost as if a completely different person took over the account, and I guess it could have been the ZiaLater account-operator, assuming that's what happened. But who knows... I've always suspected that "account handoffs" are a less-rare occurrence than most Wikipedians would prefer to believe, but I wouldn't want to be the one to have to prove that's what happened in any given case, including this one.

The shift in Aug 2020 does definitely seem notable, but as a slight counterpoint against a hijacking explanation it is worth considering there were at least a few possible signals of interest in Latin American topics before that—the creation of a userbox in 2016, the edit to a template about Peru in July 2020. Of course that's not a lot and perhaps the original WMrapids was simply wowed by a nice restaurant once, but worth keeping in mind.

More on the Grand Rapids metro area stuff: ZiaLater's edits (main, talk) to voting machine company Smartmatic (T-H-L) apparently attracted negative attention from the company, prompting them to sue a Wyoming, MI man they identified as ZL in a West Michigan court filing according to a local news outlet. The lawsuit sounds kind of frivolous but it would certainly be interesting to know what the "special interest group" they allege was paying him was if anyone's keen to mess around with PACER at the moment.

(WMrapids is, naturally, the single biggest contributor to the Wyoming, Michigan article, giving painstaking attention to every bit of local history on the page in their edits. Again though I do find it hard to square the two POVs—ZiaLater wasn't like completely 100% robotically pro-opposition camp and neither is WMrapids anti, and on the archives of pages edited towards the end of ZiaLater's tenure like Talk:Operation Gideon (2020) (T-H-L) where they both argue for "coup" you can clearly see some points of overlap, but they did have strong leans in apparently opposite directions. If it is the same guy, you have to wonder what prompted the change of heart.)

[rnu]

• Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Venezuelan_politics (T-H-L)

Was following this with some casual interest and recent developments made me think I'd ought to try a first post here. WMrapids (T-C-L) and NoonIcarus (T-C-L) (formerly Jamez42) may be familiar to some in the audience for frequent edit wars on Venezuela articles that perennially show up on ANI, with NoonIcarus in the pro-opposition groups to Venezuelan gov camp and WMrapids in the anti-opposition groups to Venezuelan gov camp to offer the short explanation. I express no strong opinion on the relative merits of each side due to lack of subject knowledge other than gut dubiousness of defenders of the Venezuelan government but a pretty dim view of both of these folks judging by what gets to noticeboards.

A recent ANI thread (link) resulted in a topic ban for NoonIcarus from Venezuelan politics, which drove S Marshall (T-C-L)—who felt this thread, though not entirely meritless, was lopsided and populated mostly by people sympathetic to WMrapids' POV—to request an Arbcom case. For a while after being accepted due to the obvious history of clusterfuck in the area it proceeded mostly in predictable fashion with the Evidence phase being the usual back and forth between NoonIcarus and WMrapids and their respective sympathizers.

Then out of the blue WMrapids was checkuser blocked by Primefac (link). Simón, el Silbón (T-C-L) was similarly blocked a minute before (link), and did also edit a few Venezuelan articles from a similar POV, though that account seemed to focus less specifically on Venezuela. I haven't looked deeply but my quick skim wasn't able to discern a super obvious motive for socking. (NoonIcarus mentioned (link) emailing private information to the Committee after the two blocks occurred.)

(Before this I had wondered a tiny bit about a relationship between the earlier ZiaLater (T-C-L) and WMrapids owing to the shared interest in the same tiny Grand Rapids articles and Venezuela and WMrapids' activity surging three days after ZiaLater disappears. More than this, too; some of the overlap in obscure articles edited is notable, like BAP Almirante Grau (CLM-81) (T-H-L), or certainly Femicides in Peru (T-H-L), which has barely been edited by anyone else but the two. But ZiaLater's perspective tended to be closer to NoonIcarus than WMrapids best I can tell, so I tentatively assume those things are just a really weird coincidence and I'm seeing more than there is. )

WMrapids and NoonIcarus even made it into the Venezuelan news in the past.

As to WMrapids being a bad actor ...

[tarantino]

ZiaLater used to be known as Zfigueroa. The first version of their user page says, 'Hello! I am involved with pages on Venezuela (where my family is) and places in Michigan.'

Zfigueroa is probably Zenaida Figueroa (a surprisingly common name), one of which does or did reside in Wyoming, Michigan.

[Anroth]

COVID also affected a huge amount of people geographically. Stuck in countries, maybe visiting family at home etc and unable to return to wherever they were. The change in focus might be no more than their location changed and so did their interests.

I think my favorite story of the period was author Neil Gaiman abandoning his wife (well known and respected musician Amanda Palmer) and young child in New Zealand while they were locked down to return to the UK. Faced with the prospect of having to spend all his time with his family he just noped out of it, knowing they couldnt go with him.

Its not often I go from respecting someone to wanting to punch them in the face....

[tarantino]

ZiaLater used to be known as Zfigueroa. The first version of their user page says, 'Hello! I am involved with pages on Venezuela (where my family is) and places in Michigan.'

Zfigueroa is probably Zenaida Figueroa (a surprisingly common name), one of which does or did reside in Wyoming, Michigan.

And WMrapids created the article on the mayor of Wyoming, Michigan, Kent Vanderwood (T-H-L) Vanderwood is an election denier and fake elector currently facing eight felony charges.

[estecaso]

ZiaLater used to be known as Zfigueroa. The first version of their user page says, 'Hello! I am involved with pages on Venezuela (where my family is) and places in Michigan.'

Zfigueroa is probably Zenaida Figueroa (a surprisingly common name), one of which does or did reside in Wyoming, Michigan.

I think we might be looking for *Zachary* Figueroa of Wyoming, MI rather (per the court documents from the above case and that the only Zenaida from Wyoming, MI people search engines turn up is 65, which would surprise me). The filing doesn't contain much of interest that I can tell. The "special interest group" just seems to be Smartmatic's collective term for the editors it sought to sue.

[Konveyor Belt]

While it does appear that ZiaLater has a legitimate connection to Venezuela, I suspect for others it's easy to use Venezuelan politics as a proxy for American politics, particularly to escape scrutiny and sanctions that might come in the more heavily moderated American politics area.

[estecaso]

LOL, get the sense someone is sweating...

Did you edit under another account in Venezuela politics, before the WMrapids account entered there, with prior disagreements with NoonIcarus?

(emphasis mine)

That is the concern about the second account. Again, this second account was for privacy reasons and I would feel more comfortable discussing the details about this explicitly in a private manner with ArbCom if needed (It appears the second account was blocked without any additional tags to this account for a reason, since there are known privacy issues). As I said, I'm trying to be as transparent as possible due to my own privacy concerns and I emphasize that the second account was not used for deceptive purposes at all.

I mean he doesn't really have another obvious play here than to play dumb but it strikes me as silly to just be like "Oh. Uh. You mean the account obvious it's from context I wasn't asked about?"

Obviously was leaning this way prior but after reviewing the edit summaries of the two accounts it'd just strain belief too much for ZiaLater not to be WMrapids. I could probably present this more comprehensively but since lazy at the moment you can punch in "not sure" (ZiaLater, WMrapids) or "sourced information" (ZiaLater, WMrapids) to the edit summary search tool to spot the same slight variations on stock phrases.

As a sidenote NoonIcarus is not particularly good at concealing his identity either, although that seems rather sadder and more fait accompli since people apparently already tried to sic the Venezuelan government on him; I don't know exactly how whoever was accusing him of being an "extortionist" identified him at the time but there are at least two trivially easy ways (via the signatories to the petition linked on his Reddit account, or reverse image searching the iceberg image he posted on the Reddit account) to discover he is Santiago de Viana, a Venezuelan student apparently at the Technical University of Madrid, by Googling his former username Jamez42. I would suspect NI will get off with more minor sanctions and that seems fair, but also very easy to imagine a second case here someday if anyone replaces either of the two in the arena—there is a presidential election (well, at least the semblance of one) coming up in July so plenty of editing to do.