If I were running a competing site to EliteTrader I could have a really nice time trying to ruin perhaps one of the best trader-talk sites on the net.
Not trying to be paranoid - just talking (tough) business.
If there isn't already some sorts of scanning of similar ip's and various nicknames coupled with excessive abuse or rabid behaviour, this site's owner really isn't protecting his investment of time and money.
Not that it would be easy to hinder anyone in spoiling the fun on this site, but it certainly pays to be aware.
I think we've seen some more frequent moderator activity as of late, so something is being done - it's really up to the forum participants to show their opinion about excessive abuse too.
I suggest the following:
pre-made ignore-lists - automatically updated by (a) certifiably sane moderator(s)
These could perhaps be tuned into various "topics" of "uselessness" that one would like to avoid.
This would greatly enhance the usefulness of this site.
Another solution is similar to scoring system like those on slashdot.org etc. where you get points and bonus point for usefulness, insightful, funny etc. Then threads are automatically "moderated" by only viewing the interesting parts to the reader.
That takes the fun out of being abusive - perhaps even a scoring system on how many views a single post has too would discourage some from continuing their rant. Perhaps even a public ignore count too - just for when one want to have some fun looking at the losers.
You hear, Baron, there are still things you can do to curb this bad influx and improve this site. Include some rating and classification system.
I'm not sure if there already is a module for this in the BB-systems software, but surely someone has given it a try.
Otherwise, an average programmer would quickly be able to do some hacks if you specified a general solution.