It could look very cluttered, true -- but it could be very valuable if you want to watch your words in a given journal, or quickly check to see if X could see someone's (or a community's) locked posts.

For instance, if my estranged sire were on DW, I'd probably be checking for him on other communities (as well as closing down all my posts to people not in my circle...). But no way in heck would I want to read anything he wrote, just for the bolding. Estranged for a reason... Having a nice way to spot "mutual loathing society" names would be a nice feature, even for me.