My account at
https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/ was created long before the paid anti-spam system was put in place, i could swear old accounts like mine that were in good standing had been grandfathered, but it seems it isn't...am i remembering things wrong or was there a decision to ungrandfather old accounts?
There's no grandfathering that I know of.
The payment for anti-spam protection by BitcoinPayment is 0.01 BTC, an amount now worth over a $1 which is higher than necessary to simply prevent wikispam.