RL0919

Hello. Richard Lawrence here, again belatedly responding to a thread that I just recently learned was revived. To clear things up from my side, I did not sell the noblesoul.com domain or any of my content to "Anthony Mason" or anyone else. I did take the site down voluntarily and abandon the domain after I realized that I was not likely to give it the time and effort needed to get it current again or otherwise maintain it. It appears that someone else has obtained the domain, which is totally fine by me. However, they have also chosen to repost some of my content, in particular personal essays that I had written, with their own name attached. This is something that I did not approve and only learned about today. I have sent a request to the site's contact email asking that the reused content be taken down. -- Richard Lawrence Former webmaster, Objectivism Reference Center (RIP)

Maybe this is what Richard imagines we are all up to, here at ObjectivistLiving. Let's try a slightly different bolding: That's just for you, Robert Campbell, not the entire population that participates at ObjectivistLiving. (Trying to incite dislike for an opponent by telling the audience that he is against them -- that's a rhetorical classic.) -- Richard Lawrence Visit the Objectivism Reference Center

This is most interesting. I'd never been involved in an edit war or in any other on-wiki contention with Jim and Holly Valliant while I'd been active at Wikipedia. Until March 18, 2011, when I put a single question on your user talk page, I'd never done anything at Wikipedia that you called disruptive. Now, all of a sudden, it is isn't my single act that's disruptive, I'm going around doing disruptive things. Is all this disruptiveness a recent development? Or have you been inclined, maybe for an extended period of time, to view me as disruptive by nature? Your ability to read every comment as a personal attack, complete with speculations about the sinister thinking behind it, is amazing. (Robert Campbell gets a journal submission that includes a hypothetical: "Imagine you are on a train…" He writes back to the author: "How dare you accuse me of being a bad driver.") Obviously the use of the colloquial generic 'you' and the too-easy-to-miss 'if' was a huge mistake on my part. Please consider my earlier remarks to be a draft, to be rewritten as follows: As a hypothetical generalization, in the event that a party were to make accusations of rule-breaking with no evidence, then this hypothetical act by that party would be (hypothetically) disruptive. Since I don't write to build a rococo version of every sentence, in the future if I don't make a very clear and direct reference to you personally, such as saying "you, Robert Campbell," then please assume I'm not talking about you, Robert Campbell, personally. The relevance is quite simple: You, Robert Campbell, have motives unrelated to Wikipedia to cause problems for James Valliant. Therefore, you, Robert Campbell, showed up on my user talk page trying to stir up drama about rules that you, Robert Campbell, admittedly don't understand on a project that you, Robert Campbell, don't particularly care to participate in any longer. For reasons unfathomable to you, Robert Campbell, I don't approve of this. The description of what happened is inaccurate. The IP was blocked for "vandalism" (not topic-banned, which is something different) after repeatedly removing material from the Ayn Rand article. This block was in fact unfair, because the edits in question were not vandalism at all, but rather part of a dispute over what content belonged in the article. However, Wikipedia edits made from IP addresses get a lot of scrutiny from people who monitor the "recent changes" log looking for vandalism, and one common type of vandalism from IP addresses is deleting large blocks of material. Some of these people mistook IP160's behavior in the content dispute for that type of vandalism, hence the block. My attitude at the time was that this was a matter for that editor to fix for herself. The easiest thing would be for her to log into the account she already had registered (Pelagius1) and use that. Then the IP-change-watchers wouldn't even notice her edits and such misunderstandings would not occur. If she really wanted to use the IP instead, there is a simple process for appealing bad blocks that is explained in the standard block message that was placed on the IP's talk page. There wasn't anything I needed to do; therefore I didn't do anything. Very little, which is exactly how much time I have put into it. So much distortion, so little time. My earlier statement was that an accusation of account sharing was "serious" not "soul-shattering". When discussing the presentation of evidence about this, I discussed both public and non-public information, because I didn't know what "evidence" you, Robert Campbell, had in mind. So I've never been able to render any judgment on whether it would be "some dreadful invasion of privacy"; I just allowed for the possibility. I said the end result of such an accusation would probably just be a mandate for the editors in question to register a second account. Yes, that it is certainly a less draconian result than, say, a lifetime ban, but that is because the infraction itself is relatively minor. Astonishingly, some people on Wikipedia actually have a sense of proportion when it comes to dealing with problems. Well, as I said earlier there are a lot of people on the project, so any universal statements about attitudes will have exceptions. But generally, yes, rule violations are treated much more seriously when there is disruption involved rather than just a technical infraction. In the real world, a cop who sees you going slightly over the speed limit might not stop you, or might just give you a warning. But if he sees you drag racing in a school zone while weaving across lanes and waving a gun out the window, he will probably arrest you. If he then finds a dead body in your trunk, all the worse. Not all rule violations are equal. Here's something to blow your mind: There is an official policy on Wikipedia called "Ignore all rules". Yep, that's why you, Robert Campbell, are now indefinitely blocked from editing Wikipedia. Oh, wait, that's not true. Of course they are. "Being annoying" is in fact permitted. You, Robert Campbell, are living proof of that, whether you, Robert Campbell, realize it or not. -- Richard Lawrence Visit the Objectivism Reference Center

Wikipedia's governance structure is relatively anarchic and organic. The rules aren't always clear or consistent, much less consistently enforced. So I don't blame you for having a different interpretation of the rules than I do. A third party might disagree with both of us, and a fourth party with the third party. This isn't a science. What does concern me is your apparent inability to conceive that I might have a different opinion or different information than you, which leads you to suggest I'm behaving sinisterly when I don't follow your interpretation. As a general rule, if you go around making accusations of rule-breaking with no evidence, then yes, that is disruptive. The purpose of Wikipedia (however imperfectly it may sometimes be implemented) is to create an encyclopedia, not to score points against ones enemies by throwing mud at them and hoping some sticks. If you do have evidence that is public in nature, then you are welcome to state it publicly. If it involves non-public information, then it should be communicated in a non-public fashion. If you aren't sure, assume it is non-public. This is known by some as "respecting other people's privacy", a concept that I assume you've heard of even if you don't agree with it. Actually I long ago forgot about any information regarding email from Valliant. (I'm assuming I must have read about it back in May 2009, because it appears on a page where I commented.) In any case, this is stale info that at best leads to the shocking conclusion that a husband and wife might have edited from the same fixed IP address, probably associated with their residence. It doesn't actually tell us who is editing as IP160/Pelagius2 today, or even that the Pelagius1 account was shared back in 2009. The possibility of opening a sockpuppet investigation was discussed by administrators back then, but their focus at the time was more on the editor(s) being willing to follow more substantial rules, such as discussing controversies on talk pages instead of ignoring them as IP160 had done initially. Good for them. Because I did not become imperial grand dragon of the WWW until December 2009. Although I had a Wikipedia account as far back as 2005, I did relatively little editing until May 2009, and did not return to the Objectivism articles until May 20, 2009, after IP160 was already topic-banned. But more importantly, I do not share your interest in causing trouble for James Valliant. My concern is improving the quality of information on one of the world's most widely visited websites. The biggest problem IP160/Pelagius1/2 had in that regard was not some unproven sharing of accounts by a husband and wife. The big problem was (and to a lesser extent still is) tendentious editing. If you have information that will affect that, it would be much more interesting than "stylistic analysis" suggesting husband/wife account sharing. Attitudes towards rules and their enforcement vary among different Wikipedia editors and administrators. I'm sure somewhere among the thousands you could find someone who would be up in arms about a husband and wife sharing a fixed IP address at their residence, but probably most wouldn't care unless there was some disruption coming from those editors. Sharing registered accounts is more explicitly against the rules, but even there, the bigger underlying concern is situations where organizations share a accounts among staffers in order to control articles, or where accountholders with special privileges give access to users who don't. Husband/wife sharing of a single non-privileged account, if clearly proven or admitted, would probably result in nothing more than them being required to register separate accounts that explicitly state the relationship. I have better things to do with my time than pursue bureaucratic wrangling over insubstantial matters, and even less time to pursue unproven accusations leading to said wrangling. If you want to pursue it, I've pointed you to the venue where you can do so. I'm not standing in your way. -- Richard Lawrence Visit the Objectivism Reference Center

A fundamental problem here is that although he admits to having an imperfect understanding of Wikipedia's rules (they are "byzantine" and better left "to the insiders who may actually understand them"), that has not stopped Robert from making detailed interpretations of how they apply. Now, it is fully within his rights to make his best interpretation within the limits of his own understanding. However, I would have expected that, as a professor of psychology (and for that matter, as a cognitively mature adult), he would recognize that there are differences between his perspective and my perspective, and when he observes that I act differently from what his perspective would suggest, he might consider that these differences could be involved. In particular, since I am apparently designated as one of the "insiders", I might have a different perspective on the rules that he doesn't quite understand. But that has not been his approach. Instead, he appears to assume that I agree with his interpretations of Wikipedia rules and, moreover, that I would act aggressively to enforce those interpretations. Therefore, when I don't act in the expected way, I am a hypocrite with ulterior motives that must be explained through speculative analysis of my motives and thoughts! I have made a lengthy and detailed response to his on-wiki accusations on my Wikipedia user talk page. To summarize briefly: 1) there is no prohibition on mentioning that the accounts he is talking about are associated with the Valliant household, because this has been admitted to on-wiki by one of the accounts; 2) the use of those accounts does not appear to involve sock puppetry (merely having multiple accounts is not in itself prohibited); 3) there have not been any conflict-of-interest violations from these accounts since 2009; 4) I never threatened to block anyone for discussing any of the above; and 5) I never threatened to block him personally for anything, nor did I intend to imply any such threat. Anyone who wants the details can read my full statement here. (Linked to a specific revision of the page because eventually the entire discussion will be archived.) Now, as to some more details that are not covered in my on-wiki comments: I did not reply to IP160's comments about the use of PARC because I did not see any benefit in doing so. Unless/until there is an actual attempt to cite it in an article, it is a moot point, and I seriously doubt I would ever convince Holly Valliant (much less, arguendo, James Valliant) to adopt a less pro-PARC viewpoint. So there was no reason to have an extended wrangle about it on my user talk page. I ignored his own question for similar reasons. Unless he had some particular accusation to make about the behavior of the accounts, there was no reason to get involved in a discussion about them. I could have deleted the question entirely, but that would have been rude and would have presumably trigged some sort of follow-up accusing me of gods-know-what. So I let it sit. When I noticed the next day that he had linked to it here, I posted my warning about outside parties. I did not indent it because it was not a direct reply to his question and I did not want it to be taken as such, which is what indenting it below his question would normally imply. I have no idea when not indenting a paragraph became "ostentatious". This is just one small example of the sort of hyperbolic and speculative interpretation that Robert makes with disturbing frequency. There was nothing "disingenuous" about me posting my warning about outing when I knew who the accounts were, because that basic information was already open on-wiki, so I wasn't even thinking about that when I referenced the outing policy. My mistake was not being more specific about what types of information I was concerned about (discussed in more detail in my on-wiki statement), which left my comments open to Robert's wild interpretations. There was similarly nothing disingenuous about me not "chastising" Pelagius, etc., for bringing off-wiki disputes to my talk page, because they had not done so. To have a dispute with someone the other party has to be present; to my knowledge, Nathaniel Branden does not edit on Wikipedia. My concern was not someone having an opinion about off-wiki matters, it was that someone would show up and lay into Valliant about stuff that has nothing to do with Wikipedia, or that some defender of Valliant would show up to fight with Robert, or both. That's not what my user talk page is for, and I wasn't going to have it. I'm not clear on what Robert's "parachuted from Mars" comment is supposed to imply. I knew who he was and wasn't trying to pretend otherwise, nor does anything in my comment address any of that. My message was aimed at other third parties, in particular those who unlike him did not have any prior experience with Wikipedia. In effect, by addressing those who "are not familiar with the standards of behavior on Wikipedia" (as I clarified in a follow-up comment), I was implicitly excluding him. Similarly, I knew he had posted the link, but I avoided mentioning it because there's no rule against posting about Wikipedia on other sites (well, there are some specific exceptions, but none that applied) and who made the link wasn't relevant to my warning for others. Of course this is contrary to his interpretation that my comment was meant as some sort of indirect threat to block him personally, but that goes back to the whole my perspective/his perspective thing again. I don't think I can be considered "disingenuous" for not realizing that he would interpret my comments to mean the opposite of what I intended. I did not consider the possibility that Valliant's dog might be editing Wikipedia. Normally I would think that such comments were intended to be humor, but considering some of the other inventions that Robert appears to sincerely believe, I can't take anything for granted. -- Richard Lawrence Visit the Objectivism Reference Center

Sorry to resurrect an old thread, but I just discovered this discussion and wanted to clear up some of the issues mentioned here. The Objectivism Reference Center did go offline for some time (I'm not sure of the exact amount of time, but I believe it was several weeks) because I neglected to renew the domain registration. This was simple oversight on my part. It went unnoticed for a while because I busy and not actively visiting or updating the site. (I recently made the first significant updates in six months.) I had to "rescue" the URL from a domain-sitter, but fortunately the site doesn't drive quite so much traffic as to demand an outrageous price. As someone who dislikes "link rot," I am and should be ashamed of letting the situation occur, but it was absolutely unintentional and unrelated to any other issues mentioned earlier in the thread. I didn't decide to abandon the site. I wasn't offered anything to take it down. I didn't run out of money. I wasn't kidnapped by aliens. I wasn't drugged and tossed into a swimming pool. Etc. I do not care to discuss my opinion of Nathaniel Branden or any other individual at this time, other than to say that it had nothing to do with the outage, either directly or indirectly. Ditto for my views on PARC, SOLO, ARI, or any other letters of the alphabet. I hope the explanations above help put to rest any speculations regarding this situation. I'm glad that people find the site useful and hope that the restored version continues to perform a valuable function. -- Richard Lawrence Webmaster, Objectivism Reference Center

As you may have already realized, the registration was subsequently renewed. I should note that the URL on the master list was typed incorrectly, so the link shown there is invalid. The link at the top of the first post in this thread is correct. You might want to update the post to remove the "no longer works" comment and the Wayback link. My apologies to anyone thrown off by the temporary loss of the site. It was purely an oversight on my part in not renewing the domain, and I didn't notice for a while because I was busy with other concerns and not checking on the ORC. The site was reactivated some time ago, but I just discovered this discussion of the problem while doing a web search, so I wanted to update you on the matter. -- Richard Lawrence Webmaster, Objectivism Reference Center