You're Not Helping was a group blog (mirror available here) which largely consisted of people whinging and whining and wailing about how disgusting and repulsive the New Atheists were. Their declared enemies included PZ Myers, Jerry Coyne and Ophelia Benson. The words "group", "people" and "their" should not be taken literally, as in June 2010 it emerged that the entire membership was in fact a network of sockpuppets operated by a lone individual, later outed as Walter "Wally" Smith.
Tom Johnson story
As Wally's sockpuppet network unravelled, it was revealed that he was also behind the "Tom Johnson" story (a tragic ballad of cruel persecution at the hands of the wicked New Atheists) trumpeted by pseudojournalist Chris Mooney on his Intersection blog. It was also revealed that Wally's sockpuppets were producing a substantial fraction of the Intersection comments (including attacks on people who dared to point out how ridiculous the Tom Johnson story was).
Identity revealed
After You're Not Helping collapsed, Wally's identity was largely kept secret, in return for him ceasing his activities. For some time, this deal appeared to be holding, but then Ophelia Benson started to become suspicious of a poster named "Hammill", who would follow her and Jerry Coyne around the internet, posting malicious lies. A month later, she obtained proof that "Hammill" was indeed Wally, and outed him.
Wally Smith
At the time of the You're Not Helping debacle, Walter Smith was a graduate student at the University of Alabama at Tuscaloosa. He is now an instructor of biology at The University of Virginia's College at Wise. He once had a fairly substantial web presence, but nuked most of it after being outed. Remnants include a conservation blog and fragments of his painfully bad poetry.
List of sockpuppets
Directly Admitted
(Confessions made here and here.)
- Bilbo (One of several people to use this name on Pharyngula.)
- Milton C.
- Patricia
- Petra
- Philip Jr.
- Polly-O!
- Seminatrix
- Tom Johnson
- William (Pseudonym used for above confession.)
Confirmed
- Brandon (Observed to be using the same IP address as admitted sockpuppet "Polly-O!".)
- Hammill (Caught out by Ophelia Benson.)
- Michael L. Thomas (A post under the name of admitted sockpuppet "Milton C." was five weeks later edited to give it this name.)
- WHS (A post under this name was later edited in the same time-frame as the above "Milton C." to "Michael L. Thomas" switch. The name matches Wally's initials, and the posts contained then-private details of his life.)
Suspected
The YNH comment section absolutely swarmed with "individuals" who did little else but echo the original post, and attack any dissent. While some of these could be traced to real people, it is probable that the majority were sock puppets. The most suspicious of these included:
- The Accuser
- Bad Monkey
- Bill S.
- EDK
- Julie
- PJ
- Vindrisi
- Vyspyr