If you are reading this on an archive site, be sure to check the original URL for updates, corrections, retractions, etc.
If Oliver Smith had, as a goal, thoroughly exposing the idiocy of RationalWiki — and to a lesser degree, also the WMF wikis — he couldn’t have done a better job.
From his own emails and comments on RationalWiki:
Oliver Smith claims
- He made up the brother story years ago to get unblocked on Wikipedia.
- He fed the story to many, fooling them. It was a joke, and funny as hell.
- He lied to Tim Farley.
- His real brother’s name is now being published. [It is!]
- Yet his real brother isn’t involved at all. [Is he?]
- Nobody is paid, that was all his deception.
- He’s the victim of massive harassment.
- And Lomax is crazy for declaring as possible the story that Oliver made up and repeated for many years.
Let’s take a look!
His emails to me — and my recent replies — are here.
A few days ago, I protected most pages dealing with Anglo Pyramidologist, requiring a password, which, for the time being ,will be revealed to those with a need to know.
Then, April 4, 2018, I received an email from Oliver Smith, from the known and verified email address for him, offering a “truce,” he would fix the RationalWiki article on me if I removed mention of him on my blog (and he sent the exact same oemail to Rome Viharo). I responded as can be seen there. I thanked Oliver for certain things and pointed out that improvement he proposed on RationalWiki would not address many of the problems created by the Smith brothers’ history, including perhaps the most serious (a massive sock and then cross-wiki canvassed attack on Wikiversity and Wikiversity users). I suggested simply telling the truth.
April 5, Debunking spiritualism attempted to edit the RW article on me to make it more about substantial subjects, but was — as I’d have predicted — promptly reverted. He then wrote on the Talk page (archive copy of the page):
Proposed re-write
I re-wrote some sections, but they got reverted. I’ve spoken to Lomax by email, and he says he will no longer disrupt or make more articles on RationalWiki on his blog etc., if we just focus more on his cold fusion and try to more neutrally present his research on this. The problem is his page has been a battleground and much drama over his activities on wikis that are mostly irrelevant to RationalWiki – its main purpose is to document pseudoscience. I just think its sensible if we rewrite his article and the drama will end.Debunking spiritualism (talk) 21:46, 5 April 2018 (UTC)
Wait? Who spoke to me by email? I was communicating with Oliver D. Smith, who was, until recently, ODS on RationalWiki. Many evidences from ODS pointed to his brother, Darryl L. Smith, as “DS.” Second problem, here, I never did disrupt RationalWiki, this was done by a series of impersonation socks. The user with an extensive history of similar impersonation would be DS, and it was almost certainly a sock of DS who wrote the article, and DS had been obsessively editing it. The page had not been a battleground except, briefly, impersonation socks vandalized it, pretending to be me.
While I have never ruled out the possibility of a third party impersonator, the impersonation patterns were those of the sock master I confronted on WMF wikis as “Anglo Pyramidologist,” and, with evidence and claims from Oliver, almost certainly his twin brother, Darryl. (AP, there, is both brothers — or Oliver Smith lied from the beginning, which he has now claimed.) The other possible troll would have had no interest at that time, and there was no cooperation from the Smiths that would have exposed the impersonations. No, Darryl was the impersonator. Or there is another possibility that arises here, and it’s remarkable. The whole thing was a lie and harassment targets were not the only ones impersonated.
This possibility aligns with the opinion of another critic of the Smiths: there is no brother, this is all one person, pretending to be two. To deal with what has been published, this requires one of two possibilities: (1) there is literally no brother, and the public record that purported to show that was fake, created by Oliver as a red herring, or (2) Darryl is silent, uninvolved.
The appearance here, given the emails to me, is that Oliver is Debunking spiritualism, who has carried on conversations with ODS and other Oliver socks, and this was all fake, deception. There is a more likely scenario, I’ll get to that. GrammarCommie, obviously believing in the tissue of lies created by the impersonator and the Smith editing, continues with
RationalWiki is objective not neutral. Furthermore this sounds like extortion to me, i.e. “do what I say or else I’ll harass you.” ☭Comrade GC☭Ministry of Praise 21:49, 5 April 2018 (UTC)
What “sounds like extortion” is a story made up by DS. I have not threatened anyone with harassment. I have pointed out the obvious: what one writes on a wiki is public and open to examination and critique. I would not attempt to coerce anyone, and have not. But someone has done this, through the impersonation socks, pretending to be me. I have circumstantial evidence — not proof — that the harassment socks were “Anglo Pyramidologist.” Yet the RatWikians who show up in this present discussion obviously assume they were me. In fact, they were designed that way. They copied text from me, using names that someone naive might think I would use — I have no history of disruptive account socking — and then tacking in threats and accusations, or simple vandalism.
I actually proposed to re-write some of it. At the very least there’s been lots of mistakes & errors on the article. What I wrote was actually a lot more objective. I would invite Lomax here to correct things he has a problem with, but he’s already published a response on his blog and I went over it. He’s mostly telling the truth about his cold fusion research. It is misrepresented by the original article creator. Of course I’m not defending Lomax’s antics on wikis and other sites (he recently got blocked on the RW reddit section), but I think the article should more accurately present his cold fusion stuff.Debunking spiritualism (talk) 21:58, 5 April 2018 (UTC)
I invited @Bongolian and a few others to discuss my edit.Debunking spiritualism (talk) 23:21, 5 April 2018 (UTC)
Remarkable. “He’s mostly telling the truth about his cold fusion research.” Who was the original article creator? That creator complained about me and I was promoted (sysop tools removed) as a result. Then another obviously related user indef blocked me for “doxxing,” when I had not doxxed, another sock had, I had merely responded. This was all someone with long experience manipulating wiki communities, preying on the naive, ready to make knee-jerk assumptions that involve primitive models of human behavior.
The “response on my blog” that I wrote was months ago and the article changed a lot since then. What I suggested, with a declared sock, was that I be unblocked and I could then make suggestions on the Talk page. What DS proposes here — and that unblock — would be more or less standard for RW, as to how RW presents itself to the world on the Main Page. But the problem is far, far deeper than my article.
DS knows how and why I was blocked on the “RW Reddit section.” He complained to David Gerard, and it was immediately actioned. There, I had responded to a few blatant attack posts, by users who showed up only to make them, referring to RW articles of which they were likely the author. Someone has been abusing RW, for a long time, as a personal attack platform. (Looking at that now, I wondered how DS knows. Reddit does not show who is banned. I logged out, and a comment I made, visible when logged in, now shows as “Removed.” This is the thread. My response was
If it’s a matter of correcting errors on RW, then, yes, this should be done. We should not however be put in a position of tone policing ourselves because of Lomax. I don’t think that Lomax is a trustworthy actor based on his past documented history here and elsewhere, and we should not cater to his whims. There is no possible guarantee that he could make that he will not continue his harassment on or off of RW. Bongolian (talk) 00:13, 6 April 2018 (UTC)
That “documented” history is full of misrepresentations and deceptions, most recently the massive impersonation socking on RW. Generally, aside from his acceptance of a load of deception, I’d agree with his position. However, there need be no binding guarantee, were I proposing some quid pro quo. Suppose, for simplicity, that the article were deleted. (That is not the most inspiring possibility!). And I committed to not writing about RationalWiki. Not that I would, mind you, I’m a journalist, but I do have choices about where to focus. If I violated my commitment, the article could simply be restored. If the agreement were public, there would be some actual misbehavior — a lack of integrity — to point to. It would take a minute to undelete the article.
These guys have little or no business experience or imagination. It’s hard to find good help. But this was all actually irrelevant, since I was not making or offering any guarantee, this was a Smith initiative, and the question arises, “Why now?”
Lomax wants some kind of deal where his lead is edited, and the cyber-harasser and troll is removed and the article accurately reflects his cold fusion research. Lomax had about 30 articles very negative about Rationalwiki users, some of these contained dox. He has now removed some those from public-view and they are password protected, but he is talking about contacting the media privately about his ban from Rationalwiki and Wikipedia. He says that is a possibility, he also says his obsession with all of this has damaged his health, I can believe that. He was writing thousands of words about this every-day, it was not normal.
I personally would have his RW article deleted, I actually voted delete in the deletion discussion. The whole thing has caused too much trouble here and these petty internet feuds with Lomax are messing with peoples lives. It would be better for everyone if this was all to just end. Obviously many people voted to keep his article so it will not be deleted but I don’t know if it is worth inviting him here to comment on what he wants changed on his article. Debunking spiritualism (talk) 00:28, 6 April 2018 (UTC)
How does he know what I want? Telepathy? He’d be evidence it doesn’t exist. But, yes, a focus on cold fusion would not be a problem, if that’s considered worthy of an article. The only “dox” was, eventually, long after being “banned” for doxxing, the names of the Smith brothers. RW articles, written by the brothers, routinely dox targets…. Oliver apparently just created an article on Michael Coombs on Wrongpedia that gives the address of Coombs’ mother, with no excuse other than a suggestion she could be harassed because he visits home sometimes.
DS showed up to comment in that deletion discussion months after it closed. It was pointed out how odd it was for him to show up and vote delete for an article that he was obviously obsessively editing. At a certain point I began to emphasize “Darryl L. Smith,” because I was realizing that it was likely that most actual damage, in many areas, was coming from that brother. Maybe he was realizing that he had attempted character assassination on a target who can defend himself. And there is more.
If Lomax permanently removed and deletes all the negative commentary about Rationalwiki on his cold fusion community blog and decides to move on with his life, is it possible his article could be deleted? This might not be policy but is it not possible to arrange some kind of deal like this? Both parties would win at the end of the day and people could move on with their lives. Several users have been doxed by Lomax on his blog so all this is having real life consequences. Debunking spiritualism (talk) 00:34, 6 April 2018 (UTC)
@Rimuru Tempest, @Readymade, @Christopher @David Gerard your thoughts about the above? Debunking spiritualism (talk) 00:39, 6 April 2018 (UTC)
I know RationalWiki reasonably well. This proposal had no chance of success as stated.
First of all, who is feeling “real life consequences?” There would be one class of such: the targets of many articles created by the crazy duo, and fewer by articles created by other RatWikians. Almost all RatWiki users are fully anonymous. Oliver and Darryl Smith are only not anonymous because they were so massively disruptive in so many fora that they attracted a great deal of attention. The first three pinged are anonymous, to my knowledge, and would not care personally about this. David Gerard probably believes he is completely secure. He might be, the legal theory on which I might sue him is thin. But it doesn’t really cost a lot to try. RW is a more inviting target, and RW actually has raised money on the idea that they need it for legal defense. RW, however, is not yet on the hook, there is due process that remains first.
The only two actually feeling consequences — or simply fearing them — would be Oliver and Darryl Smith. But they are not appealing based on the truth. I’m not sure what the point of this exercise was. It seems that DS wants to maintain the myth of “Abd harassing multitudes all over the internet,” while shutting down attention on himself and his brother. They created that myth, creating evidence for it (such as the Reddit ban, simply a decision probably by Gerard — though there is another moderator), just as they created the WMF ban by canvassing for complaints, all visible if anyone looks.
Let me put it this way: Fuck no!!! We will not cave in to every halfassed crank that suddenly decides that they’ve “reformed”. that is the very definition of whitewashing. ☭Comrade GC☭Ministry of Praise 00:43, 6 April 2018 (UTC)
Sure. But what “halfassed crank” has “suddenly decided” that he has “reformed”? The DS narrative, backed as it is by several months of bombarding RW with impersonation socks, is accepted, whole hog.
I think he has delusions of self-grandeur if he thinks “the media” will be interested in his petty squabbles and persecution complex. Password-protecting his doxing is not a particularly conciliatory action in my view: this is basically an admission that he has been a harasser. I invite other moderators @CheeseburgerFace, @Christopher, @CowHouse, @DiamondDisc1, @LeftyGreenMario, as well as the semi-active: @David Gerard to comment. Bongolian (talk) 00:48, 6 April 2018 (UTC)
The story as they would imagine it would not be of interest to the media. Did I mention the media? If I file an action, I would probably create a press release, and an organization might be involved. The main show would be an action against the WikiMedia Foundation, with RationalWiki being a minor player.
I never indicated the password protection as “conciliatory.” It was explained here.
Until this point, all my work was public, my research notes were public. “Going dark” means creating access security, as I work with legal issues, counsel, and develop necessary resources, until a final report is created and action taken. It is tempting to explain more thoroughly, but I’m resisting that. They can guess but they won’t know until this hits them.
The ordinary RW users probably have nothing to fear, it’s not worth going after useless basement-dwellers and twits and anti-crank cranks (and a handful of sincere and perhaps genuine skeptics), but RW itself might see some action, that depends on how they respond to challenges. This is a matter for RMF legal, not ordinary users, and they need not consider it.
I don’t think we should whitewash his past. If he shows signs of a changed man for over 5 years, we can add that to the article and perhaps give him a nicer writeup.—♥€h33s3βurg3rF@€3♥ Spinning-Burger.gif (talk • stalk) 03:15, 6 April 2018 (UTC)
I think he’s clueless. I have not suggested, nor would I suggest, “whitewashing” my past. I’m proud of what I’ve accomplished, but he and RatWiki in general have no clue what that is. They have believed a story invented by the Smith brothers, and intensely marketed through impersonation socking. Even as it becomes completely obvious that these brothers are liars and highly deceptive. To accept that, they would need to become skeptical of their own ideas and reactions. Which would make them genuine skeptics. Some of them would rather die first.
On second thought, why are we even covering Internet drama? We care about woo. I was under the impression that we don’t cover Internet drama for anyone on this website.—♥€h33s3βurg3rF@€3♥ Spinning-Burger.gif (talk • stalk) 03:18, 6 April 2018 (UTC)
Indeed. My answer for him: RW is covering internet drama because it allowed the Twin Queens of Internet Drama to create hundreds of sock puppets on RationalWiki (probably an understatement) to create articles that were intrinsically attack and revenge and fanaticism, it enabled them and protected them against exposure, opped them and encouraged them, because those who are loudest rueing Teh Drama often do the most to create it and enjoy it. DS here was proposing to focus on woo and alleged pseudoscience, which was, indeed, missional. But the Mob loves Drama! And it cares nothing about truth and careful and thorough research, but only wants to react to the latest hue and cry.
It is the opposite of rational thinking, so RW has a foundational contradiction. Snark is an appeal to quick reaction, and snark is policy on RW. It appeals to the immature. It’s fun. RW is not my problem. However, where the site and its defacto policies create an “attractive nuisance,” there can be consequences.
Honestly, after looking into all of this stuff I’m not so sure we can just throw it under the rug. I agree with Cheeseburger on this, let him show he decided to change through his actions and others will begin to see better of him. Let us not forget what we do here at RW.
Our purpose here at RationalWiki includes:
1.Analyzing and refuting pseudoscience and the anti-science movement;
2.Documenting the full range of crank ideas;
3.Explorations of authoritarianism and fundamentalism;
4.Analysis and criticism of how these subjects are handled in the media.Rimuru TempestRimuru Slime.png 03:40, 6 April 2018 (UTC)
What I notice is a massive confusion of conflicting ideas. If the article were objective, there would simply be no question. If facts alleged in the article were backed by sources that actually confirm the claim, or that are not simply cherry-picked from a vast corpus of work, if conclusions stated in the article could be challenged and discussed with someone knowledgeable (i.e., the article subject if the subject is willing), the issue of “change” would be irrelevant. The thinking here is high-school, as if I were some juvenile critically concerned about how people see me, and whining “But I’ve changed.” If I did any such whining, please point it out, so I can stomp on it. I change all the time, I hope I will continue to change until I die, but I am responsible for all of it.
All this discussion was based on the thinking of a deranged Smith brother, his imaginary presentation of what I supposedly wrote to him, that I didn’t. The full emails are on that page from the recent correspondence.
focusing on each and every crank rather than the ideas they espouse is such a waste of time and energy. Anyways, if this Lomax fellow is vandalizing the article, just lock it down–“Shut up, Brx.”02:33, 6 April 2018 (UTC)
That’s RatWiki. Opinions are like assholes, everyone has one. Especially on RatWiki. “If this Lomax fellow is vandalizing . . . .” Well, is he? Brx is two clicks away from seeing the history, but the RW cry is “Don’t confuse me with facts!” I never vandalized the article. I edited the article once only, in October 2017. The edit stuck. The short period of editing by socks with my name on them were not me. It’s reasonably obvious who they were, because the behavior is quite old, oft-repeated, long before I was ever involved, and only one person would be interested at that point.
I stumbled across his site at one point, didn’t think much of it, I kept scrolling down and I saw my name of his “Enablers and Supporter” claiming he was working on a draft of me. Idk what he is or was going to write (as he seems to have password blocked it) but after reading a few things of his I think now see him in a worse light than I did at first. I don’t know why he put me on one of his pages and made it seem like I told him “The Christian God is the real God and not Allah” but seeing what he said about everyone I wont really believe him unless he actually shows a change and apologized to those who he attacked. I’m not going to hold a grudge with him but he needs to show we can trust him.リムルテンペストRimuru Slime.png 04:01, 6 April 2018 (UTC)
Enablers and Supporters is a page to describe how the AP socks have managed to effectively abuse wikis and sites, and RationalWiki in particular. He doesn’t say what I wrote, it wasn’t anything like what I wrote. He was attacked by impersonation socks and believed they were me. He didn’t ask me. But he did respond to my question about a sock who impersonated him here.
To apologize for an “attack,” I’ll need to have a reference to the attack. Documenting what an account has done is not an attack. If it is, then is Rimuru acknowledging that RationalWiki articles are “attacks”? Does he and other RatWikians believe that anyone on the internet is fair game for documentation, but RatWikians? “Supporters and Enablers” would actually be a compliment if what was supported and enabled is laudable!
His report is weird. The main page shows blog posts, but all the AP and related documentation is pages, used for information and studies. There is a sidebar with Pages, which lists all of them. He would see the page hierarchy, which is RationalWiki/Anglo Pyramidologist/Supporters and Enablers, and the subpages with certain people where there are notes. All my page work is “studies.” If he was able to see the S&E page, he’d have seen, in the TOC,
Rimuru Tempest subpage (draft, not yet published)
Some of the above have been added from a narrow suspicion, and S&E may be inadvertent or ignorant or otherwise
Further down the page, there was his name and a link to his RW contributions. That was all. What does this have to do with “Christian God” and “Allah”? In any case, I looked at the draft page and published it so that Rimuru Tempest may comment on it if he chooses. It is just some notes with a little speculation. Nothing to call a lawyer over, in fact, calling that page an “attack” would be just plain crazy. Perhaps I might flesh out the subpage, except I have a hundred things to do more worthwhile at this point.
An apology and even a website wipe won’t be enough to have us remove what he has done with the past. He remains responsible for any harm he has done and he will learn the consequences of being a little less than an unpleasant piece of work. I’m not holding any grudges, but this person will have to do quite a bit to make up for all the the trouble he has caused. –It’s-a me, LeftyGreenMario! 05:41, 6 April 2018 (UTC)
The issue here is belief not founded in fact. What trouble did I cause and how? I did not create the AP sock farm, I didn’t even hear about it until September, 2017. 200 socks on Wikipedia, and then, I began to discover, many more even there that aren’t documented, they are quietly blocked. At one point an AP sock claimed to be running RatWiki, having created 700 socks. That might not actually be an exaggeration.
What harm have I done? Any specifics? I can say exactly what harm has been done by AP socks, and it will become far more visible over the next few months. The waste of time on RatWiki from the impersonation socks I certainly did not create. But RatWiki is not actually that important to me.
You have two users lying to you, here on this RW Talk page, and it’s easy to see if you look, and you don’t care. You win the prize, you have to live with the mess.
Any actual inaccuracies should obviously be removed, but don’t cave in to his threats and don’t remove information about what he’s done in the past just because he claims to have changed. Christopher (talk) 08:15, 6 April 2018 (UTC)
Again, all this discussion was founded on claims from DS. Nobody seems to suspect the accuracy of his report. This was all radically confused. I have not claimed to have “changed.” I shifted tactics, that’s all.
Since this affair began, AP socks called the studies I was doing — merely listing accounts on Wikipedia, Wikiversity, and meta (mostly checkuser-identified) — “Lies,” but never pointed to any specifics. If I have erred, I always appreciate correction, and I don’t hide my past. I learn from it.
I have made no threats. There were threats made by impersonation socks. By “cave in,” Christopher would be referring to threats of harm if one doesn’t do what is demanded, i.e., coercion. I hate coercion. What was demanded by me? (There were demands by impersonation socks.)
I would appreciate making the changes Debunking spiritualism made to the article. I’m someone Lomax smeared and doxed on his blog. He’s since removed nearly everything and is happy to stop this feud if we make amendments. There are clearly inaccuracies, just like Lomax writing lies and hearsay about people on his blog, so it would help to correct/remove the misrepresentations, errors, poorly sourced content and mistakes from Lomax’s article. Agent47 (talk) 22:43, 6 April 2018 (UTC)
Agent47 is obviously Oliver D. Smith. Early on, the AP message was that documentation of AP socking was a “vendetta” or “feud.” It was Oliver who actually emailed me, not DS … if they are different. I did hide material, and I didn’t reject Oliver’s offer, but thought that he would not be able to deliver unless he revealed the truth about the history. His comments here show that he was keeping up the story that I was lying, even while pretending to advocate some reasonable action to do what he imagined would “settle the feud.” I have some sympathy, because the truly vicious behavior was probably not him, probably his brother … but he’s completely insane, this comes out. He demonstrates that no matter how we slices it, he lied or he is lying. Why? That’s what gets interesting.
Perhaps @Debunking spiritualism could write a short synopsis here of each correction along with a supporting reference for each correction, then we can move forward. Bongolian (talk) 23:11, 6 April 2018 (UTC)
Sensible. There is actually a better way, I saw used on Wikipedia. A rewrite in user space, to be then compared with the standing article. May the better article win! and then the better might still have some content merged from the old. But it might all be a waste if I demand take-down from the RMF, which is under consideration. If the article were actually improved with a plan for keeping it that way, I might not demand take-down. Criticism of cold fusion research is normal, expected, and actually appreciated. However, I just looked at the article. It is heavily designed to defame, full of appeals to knee-jerk assumptions, single incidents conflated to an alleged long-term pattern, and other niceties that afflict far too many RW articles.
RW is full of articles created by this team. One of them has claimed the other is paid (“to the best of his knowledge”) by a major skeptical organization. It’s plausible, and the other has hinted at the same, and then this all starts to get very ugly.
And then this, together with the actual emails, takes the cake:
Lomax email
The above attempted re-writes or deletions requests is because of Lomax blackmailing, coercing and harassing RW users – so like myself we want the option of being left alone by this nutcase. Below is a harassing email I’ve just received. Lomax believes I have a brother involved in this website, I don’t. That’s the “smith brother conspiracy theory” he’s obsessed with. Aside from this misinformation and conspiracy theory, he claims to be taking legal action. But note how rude and aggressive this old prick is:
If I don’t want RW to have an article on me, my recourse is with the RMF. I did email them, they ignored it (not surprising). Next step is a certified letter, a formal demand.
You and your brother have lied so extensively about me and what I was doing, and created such a widespread mess, that the only way to undo it is probably to come completely clean, and openly acknowledge what you know, in a way that is verifiably you. Otherwise it would be considered impersonation. That is the mess you and your brother have created.
You complained to the WMF. What did you complain about? That is not going to be a privileged communication, it’s vulnerable to subpoena.
I don’t think you realize how difficult it could be to undo the damage you and your brother have done. Having a sysop account is largely meaningless on RW. Any user, generally, can rewrite an article. I could rewrite may article. But would it stick? The two of you have created a myth that the RW community believes, demonstrating how naive and gullible they are.
All those vandalizing socks on RationalWiki, copying my text, twisting it, and vandalizing with it, who were they?
David Gerard only acts when he has cover. He is, after all, real-name and vulnerable to defamation suits.
And it appears that it will be coming to that.
I basically retract my claims above. There are no inaccuracies on the article, its just that Lomax has threatened us and doxed our family members etc, that people want a way out of this dispute and some of us were prepared to give in to his demands and whitewash the article. I’ve changed my mind and won’t be further doing this. I don’t see this guy stopping his harassment, he’ll probably end up getting a restraining order against him, or sectioned under a mental health act. Agent47 (talk) 02:02, 7 April 2018 (UTC)
What claims is he retracting? His lies and misrepresentations? Who is “us”? The documentation has all been about Oliver D. and Darryl L. Smith, twin brothers, long ago (2011) tagged and blocked on Wikipedia as “Anglo Pyramidologist.” Oliver was much better known outside of Wikipedia, and many of those confronting this monster sock drawer have focused on him. Even where Darryl was mentioned, it was almost as a footnote. What shifted with my involvement was shining the disinfectant light on Darryl.
Because of this claim above, I have published the entire email set. What I wrote was not sent to Oliver D. Smith to harass him, at all. It was a response to his mail.
It was assertive, not aggressive. It did not threaten. Oliver Smith published, on RationalWiki, the WMF response to his complaint, so I know he complained. From what he has written about me and others, and from what I know I was actually doing, I can reasonably suspect that he misrepresented the truth (and he has done this with many others, getting web sites taken down, he got the mother of an enemy fired with a harassing email to her employer, and the only thing keeping him out of a U.K. prison is police inertia, which then takes coordinated action to move. Tim Farley, years ago, showed how it was done. And, by the way, I do not consider Tim Farley an enemy, and attacks on Tim Farley on RW were by impersonation socks. The Smith brothers attempt to stir up enmity, to get supposed enemies of their targets angry and to arouse them to attack their target. It’s really an amazing strategy, particularly considering how well it worked in various venues.
So I’m warning him that more lying isn’t going to help. His response: more lies — or, amazingly, his claim that he was lying previously, as if somehow that’s going to prove that those exposing him are wrong. Look how he fooled them with his lies! The stupids!
Will RationalWikians see this and realize how they have been taken for fools? I’m not betting either way. But there is more. He didn’t quote, of course, his own claims, though he refers to them with his “smith brothers conspiracy theory” rant. I will not be so shy. Quoting from his last email to me.
Ask Rome Viharo to see the last email I sent him. There is no brother. I’ve just had fun misleading people, like yourself stalking me as have other RW sysops who have tried to protect their identities. It’s a problem though that you would target and dox an innocent family member of mine, based on this. Ask Viharo to see the full email, or I can post it here later. The ” smith brother” conspiracy theory is a joke.
No, if he is not lying, he created the theory as a joke, and now is disliking the consequences. But does he claim up by telling the truth, the whole truth? No. And what he says is internally contradictory and requires a long-term conspiracy, and, in particular, a compliant brother who doesn’t blow the whistle on this. There are only two “family members” involved in what has been published by me (and by Rome Viharo): Oliver and Darryl. If there is no brother, who, then, is the “innocent family member”?
He has extensively attacked Mikemikev for publishing a page, apparently from a public record, showing the names of inhabitants for a certain house in the U.K., as doxxing his family, giving the “address,” which is a road, with no street number (apparently a rural road, so mail would go to the name on that road). As it was, technically.
Doxxing at that level, per se, is not necessarily illegal, but if it can be considered harassment, it can be subject to prosecution. Briefly, I had the text from that public record on the Identity page here. I redacted that immediately, but the Smith brothers continued to insist that I was doxxing the family. Here, Oliver Smith is claiming that he was lying back in 2011, and then further in his edits to RW referring to DS as his brother, and in prior emails to me (where he blamed “most of the socks” on his brother.” (Those are published on that same page.)
Just a little joke! Heh! Whatsa matta? Can’t take a joke?
Debunking spiritualism is, on the face, an anti-parapsychology fanatic (not actually a skeptic, “fanatic skeptic” is actually an oxymoron), easily identified by his editing patterns and interests, as what I, for a time, called AP/D, probably also Goblin Face on Wikipedia, and others. But this is all called into question by Oliver’s new claims. I do not assume that someone is lying, in any particular instance, because even liars tell the truth on occasion.
I’m not really interested in you complaining about lies, since all you’ve done is lie about me. You’re currently writing all sorts of nonsense and smears about me on Wikipedia sucks on the bizarre mikemikev section on your blog. I’ve never in my life been to Birkbeck college, I never studied at London University and never have been a “white nationalist”. Also, I don’t live close to Birkbeck. None of the accounts you claim are me are mine, but mikemikev.
I wasn’t “complaining about lies.” I was telling him that his lies have consequences. Oliver is either simply lying, or incapable of understanding the difference between a statement of suspicion and allegation. I never claimed he had been to Birkbeck college. It was simply a suspicion, and it would only take one trip, a little outing, on one day, to then create an impression that anyone editing from Birkbeck on certain topics was Mikemikev. Read the SPI reports!
“White nationalist,” a term which Oliver tosses around casually about others, is not a fact but an interpretation, a judgment, and Oliver was a supporter of the BNP, it’s easy to see his Metapedia comments. He claims that those were impersonations of him. Fine. Did he let those impersonations stand, or did he document and disclaim them? Those are matters of fact or evidence.
He is calling “lies” what arises from his own interpretations. The “mikemikev” section is a subpage of a review of a blog post on Hatewatch, where the RW article on Mikemikev was used as a source to make claims about problems with Wikipedia socking. So I looked at the Mikemikev Wikipedia Sock puppet investigations page and reviewed it. It’s quite long, and my impression is — unverified — that Mikemikev did sock extensively on Wikipedia, originally, but that, later, impersonation socks appeared, and that is a known AP pattern, to take a blocked target and impersonate them, to ramp up enmity toward the target, and that is exactly what has been done with me on RationalWiki: many disruptive socks, using my names or ready associations.
Someone is impersonating me. Who? Default hypothesis: the same person as the one who impersonated a user on Wikipedia in order to arouse attack on his work on Wikiversity. I had assumed the brother Darryl, the one with a long-term declared interest in “spiritualism,” etc., whereas Oliver had settled on other topic areas, such as racism and fascism. Now Oliver is claiming that it’s all him. There is an obvious suspicion to report.
Also the impersonation claims are bizarre, considering Mikemikev has impersonated me all over the internet including at Metapedia. I closed my account, it was then reopened to impersonate me with a false accusation of having schizophrenia. This is proven if you bothered to actually view the logs.
I’m not sure how one “closes an account” on a wiki. I think Oliver claimed to have spiked the password, and if you do this with email turned off, access is lost. Very much, this is not recommended! Anyone with a sufficiently high privilege level can “fix” the problem. Oliver has just set up an extensive task which would take hours. I did review his Metapedia contributions, and some, at least, of the logs. On the face, he would be claiming that there is evidence for what he is now claiming. It should, then, take a few minutes at most for him to point to the logs that I could allegedly examine. I’m not going to go digging through ancient refuse for something that actually matters very little. His Metapedia history is merely ironic, at most. I pointed out that he disclaimed it.
The claim of schizophrenia appears in a number of places. Given what I have seen of his behavior, by email, it’s plausible. Certainly something is radically off in what he is displaying, in the emails and on RationalWiki and elsewhere.
“Proven” is language used by believers, not by genuine skeptics, outside of narrow circumstances. There is a lost performative. Something is “proven” by a claimant to the satisfaction of a judge, an observer. It does not exist in the evidence itself. Evidence is used in a proof. Language around this can be sloppy, though. In this case, the claim and the proof exist only in Oliver’s mind. He could change that, with clear communication, but he doesn’t do “clear communication.” He just makes wild claims, asserted as fact, even when the evidence which he sometimes cites is more contradictory than confirming, when read carefully.
He depends on wiki users not caring to undertake that careful examination, but, too often, reasoning from conclusions, i.e., the conclusions stated match their own assumptions or prejudices, so they accept the claims.
I also find it mind boggling that you dispute Mikemikev is an online nazi.
I haven’t. Smith’s inability to interpret sane text is remarkably poor. He is probably referring to my comment a few days earlier, referring to what he had written that Mikemikev had written to him.
Mikemikev is cute, eh? I have little problem with his being called a racist, he may qualify, but … I just found a bio of him and I will be reviewing it. I have had no communication with Mikemikev. However, your brother is lying about him admitting to all those socks. That was obviously not what he meant.
The Wrongpedia attack on Mikemikev and his mother is beyond the pale. So you are continuing your rampage. Or is someone deviously impersonating you on RatWiki?
Where does this “dispute” the claim? Smith apparently sees everything as a dispute or argument or feud. and lack of agreement — or in this case, weak agreement — is seen as crazy opposition, as if it is necessary for me to believe what he believes or I am the enemy. Whoever has been behind all the AP mess for many years does apparently think like that. They are intellectual fascists, who is not loyal to the Cause is an enemy.
your emails are being ignored by the RationalWiki foundation, I was told this.
Far out. Told by whom? In this affair, what has appeared is something long obvious to many, but denied by some. There is a cabal. In my attempt to raise the attention of the Arbitration Committe to the issue of de-facto coordinated editing by a faction — which was actually obvious from the evidence I presented — the Committee reprimanded me by claiming I had not presented evidence of policy violations. But the problem was that this did not violate policy, unless there was off-wiki coordination. It happens through watchlist patterns. However, what has become much more visible since is that there is off-wiki coordination, so policy is being violated. And that is tolerated, and why? I find that an interesting question.
(My solution to the “cabal” problem would be not to ban cabals, but to actually encourage and identify them and to then regulate activity. It is a soluble problem, but not if the very existence of the problem is denied. Wikipedia got stuck in the idea that it could and should ban “POV-pushing,” which is what cabals do. That then made the attainment of genuine consensus probably impossible. To find consensus — which is powerful and self-maintaining — requires all parties to be at the table. This is all basic organizational understanding that was unclear to a naive Wikipedia community, mostly composed, early on, of computer techies. Not academics.)
So Oliver suggested that I contact Rome Viharo. He provided me with his correspondence with Oliver, so I added it to the Oliver D. Smith email archive here. The story is mind-Boglin.
The emails of
To repeat what I wrote above: Oliver Smith claims
- He made up the brother story years ago to get unblocked on Wikipedia.
- He fed the story to many, fooling them. It was a joke, and funny as hell.
- He lied to Tim Farley.
- His real brother’s name is now being published.
- Yet his real brother isn’t involved at all.
- Nobody is paid, that was all his deception.
- He’s the victim of massive harassment.
- And Lomax is crazy for declaring as possible the story that Oliver made up and repeated for many years.
Sometimes the truth, when it is incomplete, can appear implausible. However, Occam’s razor, here, indicates that he is now lying through his teeth, but why?
It’s obvious: His brother is pissed, Oliver shot off his mouth far too much, and his actual family is putting pressure on him, because it is indeed a possibility that the brother could be harmed.
Someone did the impersonation socking on Wikipedia, which was illegal, and Darryl might be in hot water over that, or might fear it. So Oliver, who was not being paid to engage in all this crap, and could more readily walk away, decides to take the rap, but without admitting what was illegal (the impersonation socking, for starters). Nice. Will he perjure himself if deposed? Inquiring minds want to know.
If the brother is actually “innocent,” my advice for him would be the same as I gave Oliver months ago when he was claiming his brother had been the sock master: tell the truth, the whole truth, reveal what you know, or stand as equally responsible. At that point he denied knowing what his brother was up to, even though any warm body could see it from miles away, if it simply looked.
Defamation may be remediated by full disclosure, sometimes. Legally, it’s their best shot.