I'd agree if the general layout encouraged it, but that doesn't seem to be how it works on the vB boards I've been on. Starting a plethora of threads on a scroll-style board has always been accepted while it generally gets viewed as spam on vB-style systems. Here, threads tend to appear in sparse numbers. If you scroll through the history of the board, you'll notice the pattern.
I couldn't explain on a technical level why the interface seems to encourage the post style it does, but it seems to work that way at most places like this and I tend to think that this is what the system was designed to accommodate. New threads are few, posts tend to run relatively long, and more time is invested in the content. I don't doubt that the community has a great deal of influence, too, but I just don't see scroll-style content on most vB/phpBB boards.
I can't say you're free to do as you wish here (I don't run this place, or any other), but I can say that creating a high number of threads in a short period of time is generally viewed as spam because it isn't what people expect. If that's your thing, I suppose you can do it, but I'm not sure you should expect the warmest reception.
As for SAGEing, I was once on an image board running Wakachan (mostly used for image posts, namely anime artwork) that recognized "SAGE" as the opposite of "BUMP" -- it would actively push the thread down in the list if people didn't approve of it, allowing for a vote.
Digg uses thumbs-up/down to push comments down.