I don't think that is it. madmole himself has said he doesn't let the negative posts affect him, and there's been a lot of negative posters banned over the years. Could just be madmole and team is buckling down and working to get A17 to experimental in time for the summer.
You have to be thick skin
The problem is that is a bit of a cop out - specifically in this social age. Developers, project managers, companies or company owners or any one that has 'fans,' can just rely on them to act like a sponge that sucks up all the feedback and then fire back right at the people giving it, doing it in such a negative and vile way, that it makes people not want to have anything to do with the company, product and/or it's ventures.
White knighting is worse than someone being rude. Because it's retaliatory, committing the same wrong act you just watched someone else do.
What concerns me most, is when normal, well thought out feedback (even if given with a 'negative' tone [not sure how you qualify tone with text, sounds like an excuse to conveniently ignore comments]), is disregarded because simply people don't want to hear something that isn't clearly positive.
If a developer or a creator or an author is simply in it for adoration and adulation, then no one wins.
Holding their feet to the fire is the best thing for everyone involved. We do it for politicians, police officers and teachers, so why not business men and authors, inventors and etc?
Do you know what happens when we don't? Of course we do, we've all felt it before. The consumer becomes disgruntled and feels disenfranchised by faceless companies and corporations that can make mistakes and never be held accountable.
What I expect intelligent and savvy developers to do is, be able to stay objective 99.9% of the time, and thus take every feedback as an opportunity to find something that could improve their product no matter whom gives it or how they give it.
Saying 'I don't take your views on board, because you were rude' is petulant and makes you as bad as the party you are ignoring. Don't worry about the customer's negativity, worry about your own.
Having said that, thank you to the Fun Pimps for creating a game that scratches our itch to wander an apocalyptic wasteland, with survival elements and doesn't require me to continue suffering paying Fallen Earth since it went F2P.
Looking forward to A17