The saying used to be any publicity is good publicity. I don't think that applies here. As far as the simple solution of registered users, that is a good idea that would certainly civilize things, but it would only work if everyone had to register in order to post. A single anonymous poster and it no longer works. There are many websites where this is the case and you need to be registered to post. I would imagine the traffic and number of posts would slip, so that may not be in the intrest of BOTC. But maybe a compromise, at least offer a thread that only registered users can post on in addition to the others. I think anyone who registers a username then subjects themselves to the anonymous posters is crazy. Libertydad was nearly lynched a while back.