Haha, there is nothing incidental about that!
My memory is that the negative TP count was set to mirror the 33,333 posts his old profile had
It may have also been to prove a point after the infamous "TP Gate" of long ago.
What was this incident?
It was a culmination of stuff over the years rather than one event. Basically, when we first started the TP system, we allowed negative TPs (like a lot of karma systems). People were using that negative karma system to "vote down" rivals who had a lot of TPs, so that they'd be "winning" in the TP count. The staff found that distasteful, and Bob Day (RIP) disabled the negative TPs.
Things were fine for awhile, but then we saw "cliques" evolving that would give each other TPs as much as possible, because they saw these as a sign of validation and as being successful. Discussions of being TP leaders came up, people started creating secondary accounts to TP themselves, etc. The whole thing was silly, but also very much against the vibe of Tommy Heinsohn.
So, as a gesture to the community, I reset my TPs to -33,333. The thought was if the most visible member of the forum could be deeply in the negative, then maybe some of the other members would take them less seriously.
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I enjoy the thread, thank you. But, spread those TPs around to the many others that make this site enjoyable.