[dleslie]

> this is sadly utterly terrifying and i have no idea what to do about it.

IMHO, accounts need to have non-trivial value, to all users. Social pressure will do much of the rest.

The problem with Gab, Twitter, Facebook, Reddit, even HN and such is that accounts are free and do not meaningfully increase in value with time and activity. This allows bad actors to thwart social pressure by simply switching accounts at their leisure.

It also doesn't help that there _usually_ exists few barriers to access to online communities; people tend to have a romantic view of being open and welcoming, and social networks have an incentive to keep access generally open as it increases user retention.