[bee_rider]

This seems like maybe a good use for some federated social media or web of trust methods?

Like I don’t trust the internet in general to curate these links. But one could surely find networks where the average voter could be trustworthy…

[eykanal]

Was thinking that when I wrote the comment. Unfortunately, spammers have gotten very good at gaming web of trust techniques (see amazon product reviews). This is a Hard Problem™.

[arkh]

Invite only networks were you're responsible for the people you invite à la what.cd : your invitee does something against the rules? They get banned and you get banned.

[bee_rider]

Maybe some percentage of invitees? I can definitely see the need to disincentivize imprudent inviting, but one mistake is pretty rough. Surely you’ve met somebody in real life who’s revealed themselves as a jerk after initially appearing ok.

[ansible]

That is basically the idea behind https://lobste.rs/ . There's approximately zero spam or other bad behavior.

You can look at the full user tree (https://lobste.rs/users) and see if there's anyone you know who might be willing to invite you to join.

[IncreasePosts]

Very little spam, but also very little engagement. The same post on hn might have 100 comments and on lobsters it has four.

[ryandrake]

I think we need to stop using "engagement" as a measurement of anything related to quality and usefulness.

[EasyMark]

Quantity has a quality all of its own.

[IncreasePosts]

Sure. But the odds of finding an insightful comment on HN is much higher than finding one on lobsters, merely because there is more content.

[bee_rider]

As long as the growth rate is positive and it isn’t too expensive to host, a small stable growing site could be fine.

[realo]

Hey!

I have been a good citizen of Hacker News for fourteen years now...

Anyone here would want to throw me an invite to lobste.rs?

:)

[Multicomp]

Haha that's my line! I would guess that those people who are already on the seafood website know other technical people in their day-to-day workspaces like silicon valley or Palo Alto or wherever, so it's easy for them to get a link. Meanwhile for those of us on the opposite side of the US or, barely in the Anglo-Sphere at all, we are on the outside looking in and are not likely to get a link just by being mostly lurkers and occasional contributors.

At least for me, I'm the only HN user I know except my dad who doesn't even post, he just got lurk links from his knee if the woods like hackaday.

[ansible]

I requested an invite from a guy I have only known via Reddit, we've never met IRL.

[onlyfootnotes]

like this idea too!

[EasyMark]

Yep it’s quite easy for a moderately talented spammer to undo the good work of a million people if they have a fast connection and mission to sew chaos and try to make $5