[QuantumChaos]

I don't see how this rule helps me figure out the meaning of sama's actions. At least five people (including myself) in that thread interpreted his actions as indicating that mods would use tactics like this (presumably escalating) against people they perceived as trolls. However, I would be happy to hear that this was not the case, and this action was a random occurrence.

Without any clarification, I think that this sort of thing has a chilling effect on discussion. People will self-censor for fear of being subject to harassment, either by mods or other users.

[dang]

Yes, it was a random occurrence.

[SamReidHughes]

Why would it be a bad thing if mods used escalating tactics against these things you call trolls? Nobody that isn't subject to paranoid delusions is going to self-censor because they're afraid "sama" will harass them. So far he hasn't harassed anybody, so why are you proposing that mods might do so? Last I checked, a guy that called out "sama"'s bullshit in his blog still posts here and isn't being harassed or silenced by mods. That's because there's a difference between posting endless shitty vacuity under alt accounts and writing with the intention of benefiting the reader. And there's a huge difference between having a chilling effect on discussion, which is what moderation is supposed to do, and harassment, which I don't think you know what that is. If anything, it's what these so-called trolls do to HN. I have no idea how anybody that isn't a p-zombie can possibly look at the folks that run this site and think that these people might be out to get them. I don't think they're interested in making this site any sort of Casablancian dystopia. You can tell this is the case because that's what they say. (Note that they didn't literally actually say this. Just like how they aren't literally actually saying they're not going to reveal all the alternate account havers yet somehow I know this.)