[RajT88]

Next-door is filled with dark patterns.

Some, I actually admire. For example: Debates about national politics are against the TOS.

Makes sense, they don't want a locally focused forum turning into the usual partisan cesspool.

So when inevitably threads turn to national partisan politics, there seems to be some flag which is toggled. You might get notifications about replies to your posts, but click yields "This comment has been deleted". You have to use one of a few workarounds to catch up with the whole thread. Boom: Fewer shitposts by virtue of slowing down the whole discussion to a near-standstill.

[int_19h]

Anybody can flag a post or a comment on Nextdoor, and people do so quite a lot. Most of it is "this guy said something I don't like", but depending on the person reporting, they might be savvy enough to look up a rule that's actually violated by the post/comment they didn't like. Leads of neighborhoods where the post/comment showed up then get a notification to vote on whether to delete it or to keep it.

[RajT88]

Ah, but for these threads you get the "this post has been deleted" for many posts which 100% are still there. It just takes extra work to be able to see them.

Once you have seen it and dug into it a bit, it feels very intentional and sneaky.