From Skeptic Overlord ATS

[Snarl]

To be fair, I have seen certain of the shills/trolls disappear for periods of time.  I suspect in those cases they got hit with temporary bans.

Brilliant post, my friend!!

I would guess a couple of accounts were professionally managed.  At least one very prominent member had numerous accounts ... the writing style was a dead giveaway ... and he moved from one account to the next almost permanently.  I never saw an account of his closed-out, and when I asked about him specifically ... I was answered, but with a non-answer.

Have always wondered what happened when the mod-rift occurred.  Some real a-holes became scarce.  Some (not enough) mod tags went away.  Sometimes, when I'm looking through older threads, I see banned members ... and all I can see in the thread after that is the tragedy of a lost account.

I know I would never look back at ATS if I was banned.  There are good people posting over there.  But most of those same people have also posted over here.  It's harder to participate on this board, but I sure do like our members.