Les Jones

Media Behaving Badly > Patterico Outs Michael Hiltzik's Sock Puppets

Patterico makes a slam dunk case against LA Times columnist/blogger Michael Hiltzik for using sock puppets to cheerlead his opinions and bash his critics. Here's a definition of sock puppets from Wikipedia:

An Internet sock puppet (sometimes known also as a mule) is an additional account created by an existing member of an Internet community. This account allows them to pose as a completely different user, sometimes to manufacture the illusion of support in a vote or argument. Other reasons include a desire to support or vote on an issue coupled with a desire to have one's "main" account stay away from the issue. This behaviour is sometimes seen as being dishonest by online communities and as a result these individuals are often labeled as trolls. This is often done on sites like eBay in order to bid on one's own auctions, although eBay forbids the practice.

Using sockpuppets is juevenile and dishonest. One reason I don't cite gun rights advocate John Lott's research is that he used a sock puppet named Mary Mosh to defend himself on Usenet.

Hiltizk responded on the LA Times blog Golden State. He desperately tries to obfuscate the difference between pseudonyms and sock puppets, but the commentors aren't having it. If Hiltzik, a Pulitzer Prize winner, honestly can't see the difference and can't understand why what he did was wrong then he needs a reprimand to get the point across.

Like one of the commentors says, "On the internet no one may know you are a dog but they can tell if you are a dog pretending to be a cat as well as a dog - if you see what I mean."

UPDATE: The LA Times suspends Hiltzik's blog.

UPDATE2: This wasn't Hiltzik's first ethical lapse:

In a stunning example of growing concern over technology and privacy in the workplace, The Los Angeles Times has recalled a foreign correspondent from its Moscow bureau for snooping into the electronic mail of his colleagues. The correspondent, Michael Hiltzik, a well-regarded journalist who joined The Times's Moscow bureau....

Yuck.

UPDATE3, days later: The NY Times story paints the issue as being about pseudonyms, rather than sock puppets. The NYT fails to use the term, and also fails to note that Hiltizk's multiple sock puppets referred to each other and to Hiltzik in the third person.