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Ask HN: Please restrict new accounts from posting

news.ycombinator.com

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Re: Ask HN: Please restrict new accounts from posting

#401

Post by gnabgib »

HendrikHensen wrote: post #153
laborcontract wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please do so. And, forgive me if I speak heresy, but there has to be more proof of work (friction) to create accounts. I was shocked at how easy it is for something like chatgpt atlas to create new accounts on the fly.

I rotate accounts on "social media" (mostly Reddit and Hacker News, the others don't interest me) every few weeks or months to make sure not too much of my post history accumulates in one account. I would dislike it very much if there would be high friction to create new accounts. On the other hand my behavior is probably a major outlier.

You are aware of the guidelines? (You are not fostering community)

> Throwaway accounts are ok for sensitive information, but please don't create accounts routinely. HN is a community—users should have an identity that others can relate to.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re: Ask HN: Please restrict new accounts from posting

#402

Post by throwaway2037 »

vova_hn2 wrote: post #355
magicalhippo wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is that we might lose some gold. Not too seldom have I seen the author or a significant party of a story chime in through a fresh green account, as they were alerted by the story being posted here one way or another. And usually when they do it's very interesting. As such I would find it detrimental if they had to jump through too many hoops so they don't bother or it takes too long so the thread dies bef…

This problem can be solved by an invite/vouch for system. New account can be invited or vouched for by an old account with good karma. If an account that you vouched for starts spamming and/or slopposting, you lose your vouching for abilities for a period of time or forever.

I didn't know anybody here before I joined. (I have been here for a few years, and I still don't know anybody here.) How would a person like me get invited or vouched?

Re: Ask HN: Please restrict new accounts from posting

#403

Post by qingcharles »

onionisafruit wrote: post #390
AussieWog93 wrote: post #266

Reddit has tried this approach and, IMO, it's failed. A new human user will spend actual time creating a thoughtful and helpful post, only to be greeted by "sorry, your post has been removed by automod because you don't meet criteria". They get disheartened and walk away forever. The spammers, on the other hand, know how the rules work and so will just build their bots to work around this (waiting 30days, farming kar…

It’s worse than that. On r/news they shadow ban anybody who doesn’t have verified email. No message or anything. Just nobody sees your comments. I probably made 20 or more comments there over a few months before I figured it out. It felt humiliating.

It's even worse than that. They preemptively ban you outright on lots of major subs for posting on other subs. For instance, I can't interact with r/pics because I once commented on r/redditachievements. And a housemate once upvoted a pic on there which got us both banned for a week because Reddit thought I was trying to do a run-around on the ban.

I still love Reddit for all its flaws though.

Re: Ask HN: Please restrict new accounts from posting

#404

Post by throwaway2037 »

munksbeer wrote: post #366
AussieWog93 wrote: post #266

Reddit has tried this approach and, IMO, it's failed. A new human user will spend actual time creating a thoughtful and helpful post, only to be greeted by "sorry, your post has been removed by automod because you don't meet criteria". They get disheartened and walk away forever. The spammers, on the other hand, know how the rules work and so will just build their bots to work around this (waiting 30days, farming kar…

Literally me on a DIY sub. I needed some advice, got auto removed, never went back.

Same. Not DIY, but my first post was rejected and I was banned. LOL. I guess that is moderation in action!

Re: Ask HN: Please restrict new accounts from posting

#405

Post by qingcharles »

stuartjohnson12 wrote: post #288
AussieWog93 wrote: post #266

Reddit has tried this approach and, IMO, it's failed. A new human user will spend actual time creating a thoughtful and helpful post, only to be greeted by "sorry, your post has been removed by automod because you don't meet criteria". They get disheartened and walk away forever. The spammers, on the other hand, know how the rules work and so will just build their bots to work around this (waiting 30days, farming kar…

It failed on Reddit because Reddit is maintained by a bunch of volunteers to whom Reddit provides woefully, woefully, horrifically underdeveloped tooling to automate their communities in a more nuanced way. Hacker News has three advantages. First, it is moderated by the same people who build the tooling, so the incentives are aligned. Second, it is an enormous source of soft power for a venture capital firm with the…

Moderating Reddit subs can be a huge money maker. I know people making $100K/year from it. There are cabals, especially in the adult sections. Reddit has tried to address this recently by limiting the number of subs a person can moderate, but that just causes these big accounts to create more user accounts and split all their subs up that way.

Re: Ask HN: Please restrict new accounts from posting

#408

Post by Springtime »

andai wrote: post #350
Springtime wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That dev made many videos about its creation and motivations though and along with their personality I think people would be understanding.

Yeah, live streaming it would be a good option, I thought of that too. Not sure I understand your 2nd argument though?

> Not sure I understand your 2nd argument though?

Sorry, I meant in the context of that original dev their earnest fixation/obsession with their creation came across in their personality that I think made people sympathetic.

Re: Ask HN: Please restrict new accounts from posting

#410

Post by qsera »

I vote against this (and this is coming from some one who believes HN contains a lot of shills)

Bots are recognizable and can be selectively ignored. But an echo chamber that would result from measures like this cannot be, because you cannot see the potential comments and posts that were snuffed because some one didn't bother.

If you want HN to be a place to feel comfortable and your world view to be unchallenged, sure, go ahead. But then we already have reddit.

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