PSA: Eugine_Nier evading ban?

Friend of mine did it via computational complexity: using gzip (as an approximation for KC) for attributing classical latin literature to their respective authors by checking which strings add the least additional complexity (due to shared writing styles, word choice, etc.) when compressed together and then clustering. Worked like a charm.

ETA: These were large bodies of text, however. Probably not gonna work for a bundle of comments, except for me, due to my overuse of "obviously", obviously.

It is something Eugine did. I think Unkown's point is that it is additional evidence that this is Eugine.

Fair enough. Sorry then.

Overly risky for whom?

For being wrong.

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As far as I know LW doesn't have a well set-up report & moderation system. [...] I don't remember seeing a list of all the mods on LW or which of them is currently online.

That's true, and fair.

One of the problems with moderation is that cooperation with LW admins is very slow. As in: extremely slow. Which means: even more slow than you imagine after reading this. Certainly much slower than I imagined when volunteering for this role.

Using my own moderator powers, all I have is a "Ban user" button which can ban a user. (And a corresponding "Unban user" button.) That is the whole moderator user interface as far as I know. If I am wrong, please educate me.

So, my options as this moment are: (a) ban Azathoth123 because I feel sufficiently convinced that he is a reincarnation of Eugine Nier, or (b) send an e-mail asking for more evidence, and wait literally forever, or (c) ignore the whole thing. From the outside, options "b" and "c" seem indistinguishable, and... well, how much happy would you be if I started using the option "a" as a general strategy?

What would really help me at this moment:

Someone with knowledge of Python and SQL, willing to cooperate with me for a few weeks (an hour or two every week). The task would be: reading and analyzing a few already written scripts to understand how exactly the data are stored in database (hint: it is a horrible "database implemented in a database" antipattern); and then writing a few scripts to generate reports from the database, based on a pseudocode I would provide. I could then use the reports to make decisions.

I realize I should have written this much sooner. Uhm, better now than never, I guess. (I thought I would learn some Python and do this myself, but I never put it as the highest priority, and outside view says it's unlikely to happen in a reasonable time.) So if you know Python and SQL, and are willing to do some free work for LW, please contact me.

(Note: The person writing these scripts will not get access to any private data. I will check the scripts before running them, and the intermediate reports will be anonymized.)

No problem. I would have retracted because of the significant downside if you happened to be wrong. Though it's still possible, I'm not really worried about it anymore given Yvain's comment.

PSA: Dahlen may be wanted in Argentina for absconding with 43 llamas. I have nothing against Dahlen, but you should guard your ungulates!

EDIT Retracted for publizing unconfirmed rumors

P̶S̶A̶:̶ ̶D̶a̶h̶l̶e̶n̶ ̶m̶a̶y̶ ̶b̶e̶ ̶w̶a̶n̶t̶e̶d̶ ̶i̶n̶ ̶A̶r̶g̶e̶n̶t̶i̶n̶a̶ ̶f̶o̶r̶ ̶a̶b̶s̶c̶o̶n̶d̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶w̶i̶t̶h̶ ̶4̶3̶ ̶l̶l̶a̶m̶a̶s̶.̶ ̶ ̶I̶ ̶h̶a̶v̶e̶ ̶n̶o̶t̶h̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶a̶g̶a̶i̶n̶s̶t̶ ̶h̶i̶m̶,̶ ̶b̶u̶t̶ ̶d̶o̶n̶'̶t̶ ̶t̶r̶u̶s̶t̶ ̶h̶i̶m̶ ̶w̶i̶t̶h̶ ̶y̶o̶u̶r̶ ̶u̶n̶g̶u̶l̶a̶t̶e̶s̶!̶

E̶D̶I̶T̶:̶ (̶c̶o̶m̶m̶e̶n̶t̶ ̶r̶e̶t̶r̶a̶c̶t̶e̶d̶ ̶f̶o̶r̶ ̶p̶o̶s̶s̶i̶b̶l̶y̶ ̶s̶t̶a̶r̶t̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶b̶a̶s̶e̶l̶e̶s̶s̶ ̶r̶u̶m̶o̶r̶s̶)̶

I get it, someone's gotta be the martyr, for the common good. Watched The Dark Knight too recently?

Since the moderation is too hands-off, we gotta do all this publicly to generate pressure on the mods! In a forum with around 5 threads per day, on a good day. That's the kind of content conducive to rationality discussions, identifying who may skirt a rule then create a public outcry for blood until the mods have to step in. You do understand he was banned for mass-downvoting, which is something his new account isn't suspected of? That he contributed a significant number of upvoted comments otherwise?

It's not easy, or pleasant, and it draws undue attention upon myself rather than the situation.

The hero we deserve. /s

So anyone who isn't willing to fight/engage a public accusation and step in the ring is implicitly guilty. That's the kind of community that's fun to be a part of.

Well, if I accused you of being a poopy head, and you didn't step in to defend yourself ... I guess that would mean, yea exactly: You're it!

Go tell that to a mod on any functional, actively moderated community. Or to a judge, for that matter. See how that would fly there.

It's how the world works, not how the world professes to work. There's a difference. The statement you so vehemently disagree with is mostly a corollary of taking "agents are goal-oriented" as an axiom. It's so close to a tautology as to be somewhat vacuous.

But we seem to live on different planets. I'm on the planet where corporations use every loophole they can to lower their tax burden. Where political donations use whatever route is just legal enough to achieve their goals. Where close to noone ever has refused, say, a severance package based on "I don't deserve this and just got it on a technicality". What are these phenomena like in Dahlen-land, and which xkcd strips are they based on? I apologize: I know I said planet, not land.

As counter-intuitive as it seems, meta-threads which (even inadvertently) fit the "drama bait" label generally increase overall drama, regardless of their actual intent. Drama bait such as this topic is click-bait and attention-bait, unfortunately. If you want to reduce drama, trolls need to be discussed/removed with the least amount of noise possible, not to thundering applause to wake up the mods. People applaud the loudest in the arena, with blood on the sand. That's not what I want this community to be. In forums I care less about, I'd upvote this topic, just to see shit go down.

(I'm being nice by phrasing this comment so antagonistically. Gives you the option to tap out on that basis. It's not like you'd want to feed the drama, selflessly promoting publicly identifying rule-breakers. Or rule-skirters, undesirables in any case!)