Topic: A Single User With Multiple Accounts: Are There Reasons For Them Being Accepted? (Read 740 times)

Hhampuz does not believe PrimeNumber7 is Quickseller.  He told me it will take more than just me to convince him. 

Will QS/PM7 stop pretending he is not both? 

I think that the higher the rank and the longer the seniority, the higher the chance that someone has more than one account. But why should it be bad ? This is not a public directory

Let's see: LoyceV, LoyceBot, LoyceMobile, LoyceBot2, nukebot and of course there can be other reasons to create an account.

Nothing wrong with it as long as you don't enroll them on a signature with the intent to abuse the campaign and farm. I would say that having an multiple account is only acceptable at the range of two account per person, anything beyond that is unacceptable. Two accounts because you can use the other as a throwaway account for your radical and often flag worthy comments so you don't have a problem with your main account being persecuted.

Sorry even though the post from LoyceV already mentioned it, I feel I should make a similar comment too. If the campaign manager knows the person signing up is an alt and then decided to not accept them, that is the choice of the campaign manager and no amount of lying and cheating can justify enrolling multiple accounts for the sake of cheating.

Can you elaborate on which club you are referring to and who those right users are?

Rules of some campaigns include that having an alt is unacceptable.
Well, I don't see any threads that encourage and if someone is suspected, everyone goes in a witch hunt.
@hilariousandco has an alt that is enrolled in a signature campaign as you have said in your previous reply that sparked this argument with me. I hope that you wouldn't mind that I am arguing with you. I wouldn't say that @hilariousandco is an abuser.

Why would it be a problem if the campaign manager doesn't allow you to join with more than one account? That doesn't justify cheating.

That's not true. Anyone can make an alt account, and nobody will hold that against you unless you do shady things.

Please name some examples of alt abusers who get away with it.

I don't think that it will be the case, if the manager knows that you are an alt account, there is a 100% chance that you are not going to be accepted in that campaign. Your analogy is good but we all know that in this forum, if you have a proven alt account then you are shunned for it. Exceptions include if you are in the club and you know the right users.

Thank you for explaining. There is a strong case for what you say and there is another case for those choosing/having multiple accounts not using the same campaign manager twice regardless of the number of accounts a user has. Another case being made is definitely not participating in the same campaign using multiple accounts.

There are 20 votes in the poll so far and every option has been voted for at least once. So much for consensus  

I mean this one.

Why would you join multiple campaigns and occupy someone else's spot? You already have your own spot. Doesn't sound right to me even if the campaign manager allows it, it is not right.

*I think that way because I believe sig camps are not jobs. It has nothing to do with communism or socialism. If sig camping was a job, then it would make sense to join as many camps as you can and post as many posts as you can, but it is not a job.

**Let everything aside it is impossible to produce all quality posts when you join multiple campaigns. Nobody can make me believe otherwise.

This is a very liberal view and one I broadly agree with but when you say you have no problem with public alts as long as they do not join multiple campaigns - do you mean:

- using more than one account participating in the same signature campaign

or

- only one of their accounts should participate in a signature campaign and all their alts should have no signatures

Isn't that obvious? If you take my car without my consent it's stealing, but if I tell you you can take it it's okay.
As long as a campaign manager knows about it, they can take an informed decision whether or not to accept your alt account.

I see no problem with public alts as long as they don't join multiple campaigns.

Secret alts can join multiple camps and pretend like they are different people as well.

Nobody is asking you to punish alt accounts btw. I think thats a job for the admins/mods. (if they are interested) Leaving a note on those accounts would be cool though.

Isn't that unfair to the busted signature campaign farmers? Because they technically have the similarities with the users mentioned above. Most users in this forum frowns on the idea of multiple accounts which makes this farmers be ashamed of what they are doing but there are some users that are tolerated. So what @LoyceV is saying is that it is alright to have multiple accounts doing signature campaigns as long as the forum knows about it? I know that it sounds like I am fighting @LoyceV but I am just asking question because what I believed to be wrong is right for a select few.

You are correct, that is against the rules, but theymos does not enforce the rules that strictly. In your example, if the two posts were made 25 minutes apart, chances are the thread is not very far down on the 1st page, so it would not really be an extra 'bump'.

I am talking about a very small number of posts, not an ongoing conversation. Maybe 3 posts out of a thousand that someone makes. Is this something that is hurting anyone, or causing any real problems? The answer to this question is no. It might be a little tacky, but no one is getting hurt because of this.

I do wonder what would happen to the forum with regards to the number of daily/weekly/monthly posts if the promoting, managing and participating in signature campaigns were banned. What other motives remain for users to have multiple accounts apart from trolling and chatting to their alts? Signature campaigns are a big draw here.

We're going to punish people for prospective damage? What about people who have public alts instead of secret alts? Is it now suddenly not direct financial damage in your example of opportunity cost?

"By milking the forum for money" I mean cheating the signature camps with multiple accounts.  That's the main damage they do because that is straight up stealing from the others.

If people fill the campaign spots with their alts, legit users that have only 1 account won't get accepted.

That's not a good thing no matter how you look. It is a direct financial damage.

The other one, "controlling the narrative" could cause indirect financial damages.

I just noticed you changed his user name in the reply you quoted from Quickseller to PrimeNumber7  



According to your post if the user is not milking the forum for money then the damage is kind of acceptable but where do signature campaigns fit in to this? Nobody can milk the forum (website) directly but they can milk the signature campaigns or farm accounts to show false escrow transactions and then try to run off with stolen funds.

What you said about having enough sock-puppets under your control is like having a media of your own - I agree with this and it is another down side of having multiple accounts because you can try to push forward your own agenda and where the negatives outweigh the positives.



Signature campaigns all have their own rules, those signing up cannot dictate to the campaign managers what the rules should be. They sign up on the basis they agree to the rules therefore saying a cheat who enrolls 5 user accounts to a signature campaign is completely fair is anything but fair, it is exactly the opposite. If the campaign manager says they welcome sock-puppets and alt-accounts then there is no problem whatsoever but breaching rules is not acceptable.



A "51% discussion in threads" analogy is a perfect one to use under the circumstances. For duplicitous account operators who want to push out their agenda yet have no intention of entering signature campaigns, since the threshold can never be determined as it is down to individual opinion they too are rightly looked at with contempt.

So:
LoyceMobile: Hey LoyceV, how much Forkcoin dust do I need to split my coins?
LoyceV: Thank you for your interest LoyceMobile, you only need to buy a very small amount.

That would violate this rule:
And it's just dumb If it's a FAQ, the answer could just be added to the OP.

That being said, I do sometimes post from my Mobile to notify my main account to check things.

Sockpuppeting as an excuse for shady shit makes zero sense outside of the account farming universe. If it breaks the rules (or is untrustworthy, etc) when done with one account, it still breaks the rules (or is untrustworthy, etc) when done with multiple accounts.

Seems redundant given those specifications, doesn't it? I can't think of a reason to create two or more posts with an alt conversation - in what situation does one post or do a series of edits not suffice?

---

Maybe some argument based on privacy and the ability to respond to a separate cryptographic identity - which is probably what the smarter alt-ring bumpers would also use as an excuse. I'm sure that people who have been doing account farming for a long time have figured out the optimal way to connect their accounts' replies together to reduce the amount of overall work while being just constructive enough to work under the forum rules.

Realistically, unless you reveal yourself to the forum and link multiple cryptographic identities together, no one will know about your alt accounts. Ban evasion is not difficult and neither is account farming. It's probably the road to a comfortable lifestyle for many people who live in low CoL areas.

I wouldn’t be surprised if someone has been banned for bump spam involving multiple accounts. I also think a few people have been banned for running bump spam services.

I would say it wouldn’t be unreasonable if someone who has a sales thread uses their alt account to ask a frequently asked question so long as the question is answered quickly so not to result in two bumps that seriously affect where the thread is located.

IIRC there have been cases in the past of this happening - in particular, relating to bumps if memory serves.

In general, I don't think it's necessary to have a conversation with yourself. Any depth that you want to encompass in your post should simply be confined to a single account or better yet a single post - additional dialogue can be edited to the user's posts so I don't see how it can be constructive.

My understanding is that if one person is banned then all their accounts are banned, even if some of their accounts don’t have a ban applied. I don’t think forum rules around multiposting applies to someone posting from two accounts, so it would be okay to use an alt to ask a question for example. If talking to yourself became excessive, they might get banned for low effort posts with a paid signature. Also, if excessive, they might get banned for bump spam if the conversation took place in a sales thread, but I think the threshold would be far above zero for this to happen.

Given that the forum treats alternate accounts as the same cryptographic identity and that the forum rules are applied to mentioned identities (e.g. bans, consecutive posts), I see no reason why talking to yourself (between two accounts) would not constitute as spam. Rather than write a single post that is edited with the content or rather than replying to other users, the individual is effectively inflating their posts and creating meaningless replies.

Of course, once you start getting into multi-user discussions, it's a more complicated issue: do we have 51% discussion attacks where the alts control the conversation, yet are not considered spammers or rule-breakers because there is enough of an external flow of replies? What's the threshold here?

Yup basically..


No alts in a sig camp accepted anonymously is a stupid rule because it’s unenforceable..
Breaching contracts is bad, but their gonna do it, and you’ll be chasing them forever..

Get rid of the rule.. It’s more fair anyway, if he can get 5 accounts in and you can’t even get one, he wins.. Completely fair..

Breaching contract though is untrustworthy..
You guys ever see the bait bike pranks on YouTube? Lol

Though the users Zapo and aTriz do sound familiar I cannot recall interacting with them and have no recollection of those names being involved in anything shady so cannot comment but in principle I think a campaign manager is hired in the knowledge he is working on multiple projects/campaigns. It is then the campaign manager who makes his own rules as to what conditions are in place before anybody could participate in his campaigns which would involve a ban on multiple accounts so I think there is a difference.


I would think that might be a reasonable thing to do though there is no perfect way to handle it simply because there in no consensus in the forum about it. Some might find it acceptable if using multiple accounts for signature campaigns but not using the same campaign manager twice unless they are told of the accounts before participation - might be something for those involved with multiple accounts in a single campaign should consider.

If the user isn't milking the forum for money the damage he cause is kind of acceptable.

However using multiple accounts without informing the public causes some other type of damage and it is not spamming.

Spam is the least of our problems here.

It is sockpuppeting.

If you have enough sockpuppets under your control, it is like having a media of your own. Like having an army of fake individuals. This is as dangerous as robbing the sig camps.

But if a person is determined enough, he/she can fool everyone else so it is pointless to try to fight this unless he/she makes huge mistakes and give signs. They sometimes do.

tldr; it is better to have one account per person but if they decide not to, you cannot do jackshit to counter it.

Then why are you still claiming you didn't lose the election?   If that's your true opinion, you are a hypocrite.

Please do.

I dont think there should be rules or regulations for the sole purpose of having a rule or regulation. Some rules are intended to help prevent spam like posts, however if someone can make many posts without quality suffering, there shouldn't be a problem.

The argument that a campaign would lose out on free advertising from excess posts someone makes falls on its face. There should be no expectation that someone will receive something in exchange for nothing, and someone may not provide a service if they knew they were not going to receive compensation for said service.

IMO the best policy is to make everything transparent, and to make sure everyone involved is fully aware of the circumstances.

For me, there is no issue using multiple accounts if he/she doesn't abuse forum rules & campaign rules as well. Never mind if the accounts as known or hidden. Because forum allows to create multiple accounts, and currently it's not very easy to build an account on the forum due to the merit system. If the campaign manager allows multiple accounts from the same person, then it shouldn't count campaign abuse since the manager is aware of that. But honestly, it's really not looking good. Joining different campaigns under different managers would be a nice choice to avoid campaign abuse.

I understand your sentiments I really do but within the scenarios you stated my opinion is the word greedy would be applicable but evil is a bit excessive...



People could have a whole host of reasons why they would use more than one account in the forum. Maybe the common reasons would be to join multiple signature campaigns but there have to be other reasons too and not all of them have to involve deception.



Interesting views. I would have thought most users might be thinking two things:

First, that using multiple accounts for signature campaigns are acceptable as long as they are not enrolled in the same campaign using more than one account unless it is with explicit acceptance from the campaign manager - therefore the campaign manger would know either via PM or off forum chat.

Second, that using multiple accounts for signature campaigns are acceptable as long as they are not using the same campaign in more than one campaign.

Hopefully others will start posting here to share their views....

If there's a difference for the user entering multiple campaigns from the same or from different campaign managers, doesn't that imply it's also not acceptable for a campaign manager to manage more than one campaign?
If we're going towards communism anyway, shouldn't all users have equal chance of managing the campaign? And what if a campaign manager users multiple accounts to manage different campaigns? Is that acceptable? Zapo/aTriz comes to mind.

I don't have a problem with people using alt accounts to participate in multiple signature campaigns/bounties, as long as they're not using more than one account in the same campaign/bounty.  Nor does it matter to me who the campaign manager is.  If someone was enrolled in two of Yahoo62278's campaigns, I think that's not against the rules and I don't think it's morally or ethically wrong.

What alt accounts should not do is make posts in the same thread, giving the impression that there's a genuine conversation happening--that borders on spam, if you ask me, and I've caught people doing that in the past.  And frankly, as long as the person with multiple accounts is making reasonably good posts across the board, who cares? 

And whether any of us like alt accounts or not, it's up to the campaign/bounty managers to create the rules that deal with them. 

The last two points 7 and 8, in my opinion, are the most normal reasons why owning multiple accounts will not raise any suspicion or accusations. Let the user hide his alternate entry if he does not commit any negative actions, but does not want to talk about it, this is his right.
Seriously speaking, why does one user need to have more than 2 accounts? This is already beyond the normal range, in my opinion. And hints at some split personality. And thus, it is not difficult to guess that they will be used for fraud.
Having several accounts for promoting bounty programs and not making the most naive mistakes, I think, is also not prohibited.
We must always take into account the fact that if we accuse someone, we must have a decent evidence base. And if it is not there, then there is no one to blame, that is, there are no prohibitions on what cannot be proved.

Personally, if asked to vote, I prefer pawn number (1).

Point number one if it describes the meaning or the effect of the actions of Alt Accounts who cheat will have the worst effect on other communities in this forum and can be said to be very greedy.

Main reason:
back to the number rule: 18,
while they are not involved in cheating and violation, I think Alt account is fine.

Second reason:
Cheating with Alt in a campaign is, obviously, disliked by every campaign manager as well as the community in this forum: example:, one of the campaign rules.

Other reasons cannot be accepted:
• basically each campaign will accept 5-20 participants to promote their advertisement, with the conditions applied.
• While the members applying for more than 50 members, though, are accepted 2-3 members, when vacancies are vacant.
• At least by not involving Alt Account in it other members' can be just as happy as others.
• If someone involves 2-3 Alt in the campaign, automatically if accepted, other members will be annoyed and disappointed if caught, Because Alt's account is greedy, of course humans like that are evil, because of their behavior, other members cannot be accepted in the campaign.

The conclusion: involving Alt's account in the campaign, companies, managers, cannot accept, because they are classified as greedy and evil.

Meaning: such an act is unacceptable.

Loyce I am about to update the thread with more options but I think I get your point 

Nice one!

A reminder:

Even hilariousandco/etc joined 2 different signature campaigns. I don't see a problem with that, as long as it's not done in secret. And that secret part is the key: if you know what you're doing wouldn't be accepted if it came out, you shouldn't be doing it.

There is an excellent thread created by nutildah where he exposed a user and his many alt-accounts: https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/--5313637


In light of the on-going conversation regarding whether it is morally or ethically correct for a single user controlling and operating multiple accounts for the sake of earning crypto for displaying a signature, I wanted to add to this and ask direct questions while seeking consensus:


1- If a single user uses multiple accounts to promote and participate in the same signature campaign - is that acceptable?

2- If a single user uses multiple accounts to promote and participate in different/unrelated signature campaigns using the same campaign manager more than once - is that acceptable?

3- If a single user uses multiple accounts to promote and participate in different/unrelated signature campaigns never using the same campaign manager more than once - is that acceptable?

4- If a single user uses multiple accounts not to promote and participate in signature campaigns but simply posts either to their own other accounts or in general to other users - is that acceptable?

5- If a single user uses multiple accounts not to promote and participate in signature campaigns but simply posts either to their own other accounts or in general or for nefarious purposes - is that acceptable?

6- Under no circumstances should single users operate more than one account (except for account recovery purposes)

7- If a single user uses multiple accounts on multiple devices (pc/mobile) but hides their other accounts - is that acceptable?

8- If a single user uses multiple accounts on multiple devices (pc/mobile) but makes it openly known it is their account - is that acceptable?



I have read the thread in question and in part enjoyed some of the debate which essentially boils down to some users which are saying if someone managed to get multiple accounts on to a signature campaign then no harm done and the fact they were not removed earlier means they had a certain quality of posting the other side which says multiple accounts stop others from getting on to the same campaign and it is deception and cheating.

Of course another part of the equation are the terms and conditions of participating in those signature campaigns because most if not all do not allow multiple accounts.

Though every single permutation cannot be listed I have chose six, it would be interesting to see the results of the poll but at the same time all views are invited so kindly post here and share them.