Not really such a good comparison. For starters, links in sigs and from your profile are permitted. If a big name professional cyclist were to post here, and were to slip up and post something that was a violation, it would be tactfully pointed out to them. Not a big issue - not because of who they are, but because we give people who are new a bit of slack because not everyone reads through all the rules before they post here. Also, if someone doesn't want to be bothered by it, all they have to do is click their mouse, and "poof". All better.

Lance and Radio Shack do not have the excuse of "we didn't understand the rules". They absolutely knew what the rules were, and made a conscious decision to break them. I'll grant you that most of the riders may not have minded, and some probably even thought it was kind of funny, but it certainly put UCI and the Tour Organizers in an awkward spot. What was "not cool" about this to me was that TRS knew they were putting others in this awkward sport (ensuring the race administration would have to take some action to ensure TRS complied with the rules), and chose to do it anyway. Obviously, it can be argued that the ends justified the means, but let's not pretend that this wasn't a premeditated act, calculated to maximize the splash in the media. Lance and Johann are brutally astute, and perhaps the only way this could have become a bigger deal were if TRS were somehow booted from the race, or were penalized and lost their team victory.