tubacolossus's Journal: Excessive bad posting? Slashdot censored me.

Here's the message I receive when I try to comment on an article:

Due to excessive bad posting from this IP or Subnet, comment posting has temporarily been disabled. If it's you, consider this a chance to sit in the timeout corner . If it's someone else, this is a chance to hunt them down. If you think this is unfair, please email [e-mail] ...

Here are the posts I had made before I first saw the above message:

• Hidden racism
• Re:And here comes the outsourcing.....
• Re:Hidden racism

I made those posts in all seriousness. All of them had a number of replies, and created a healthy, polite and informative debate and discussion. There were comments posted both in opposition and in support of my arguments.

Despite this, the posts were modded to -1 (although two of them were modded as 30% insightful). Now, I don't have a problem with the fact that some moderators didn't find my comments valuable (despite the many sensible and engaging replies). The problem is that I have been censored, effectively muted in discussion, apparently as a result of a few moderators' opinions of three posts.

And I'm not the only one. At least 30 others have had similar experiences, and the entire issue is discussed in in a journal entry.

What's even stranger is, despite the message given, I'm only banned from posting when I'm logged in to my account. I can still post comments when logged out (i.e. as Anonymous Coward), and I suspect I could post comments freely if I created a new account.

So, I can conclude from this:

1. Slashdot has a policy of censorship. It routinely bans accounts from posting comments, apparently as a result of moderation, which is unreliable at best, and over which the editors have infinite control.
2. That policy is deceptive, and only partially effective. Bans aren't by IP address, but by account. Either CmdrTaco and the other Slashdot editors are just as lazy in their censorship as they are in their journalistic endeavours, or they don't want to ban users, just "identities". They don't mind if I post as an AC that can be ignored, but they do mind if I post as tubacolossus.
3. We must change the situation. Slashdot used to support free speech as much as it could. If you think it still should, you should oppose this censorship. Contact the editors. Don't let them get away with this.