Heh, I actually was similarly surprised when Tex brought up the moderation issue in this discussion. I thought the moderation in this forum has struck a great balance between forum administration (making threads organized, merging them as necessary, etc) and (freedom from) moderation within the discussion contents themselves.

Personally, when I brought up the similar issue (fanboys attacking anyone who has anything negative to say about N900) was just a commentary and I wasn't asking for such content to be moderated in any ways.

I guess this also brings highlight to how an actively-chatting moderator can affect the direction of such discussion and blur the lines between his post as a user and his post when moderating.

I suggest using some sort of indicator (a tagline, a sig, etc) of when you're moderating and when you aren't, just so you can enjoy your previous status as a user of this site during normal discussions with us You'll know when we call your moderator side up... but most of the time I think we're just talking to good 'ol Tex.