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In Wikipedia, a new account is a registered user which has too few contributions to obtain a definite reputation, or is registered too recently for it. The opposite qualifier is an established user but there is some gap between these two extremities: an account which just ceased to be a new one does not immediately become an established user. It is generally expected that a new account belongs to a newbie, but it is actually not so for following reasons:
- A new account may be a sockpuppet, the most widespread concern;
- A new account may be a WP:clean start account or another form of a legitimate alternative account;
- A new account may belong to an experienced user of another wiki;
- A new account may belong to an experienced unregistered user;
- An established user may switch to another account for whatever reason, including loss of control over the previous account.
Although it is certain that the reputation depends on account’s edits, there is no definite threshold when the reputation appears and solidifies: it depends on which are edits, where they are made, and which interval of time they span. There are at least two different reputations: the content (encyclopedic) reputation and the social reputation. Creation of the social reputation goes approximately through following questions which established members of the Community answer:
- Is the new account a sanctions evader or another kind of a cheap sock?
- Is the new account a troll?
- Is the new account a sock and/or a blatant PoV pusher or another sort of crank?
- Does the new account possess necessary skills of social interaction?
The content reputation tends to increase with each good edit proportionally to amount of content created (or fixed), and an account which made content contributions summarily equivalent to 2–3 medium-sized articles obtains a solid reputation (not necessarily a good one, but a definite reputation), given it had not failed socially.