[mirkules]

I love this idea, but at the same time I think it is not feasible. Back then, there were no economic or even political benefits of being able to join an online community. These days, economic and political reasons are major driving factors of either controlling or infiltrating communities, so there will always be a cat-and-mouse game between insincere actors and moderators. This would be especially true on non-technical communities, although I have seen some pop up over Signal through word of mouth.

On the technical side, it’s probably a lot easier to gatekeep, but even HN has degraded significantly since its early days. Lobster.rs is the only truly technical one that has kept that spirit (to this day I am still not a member, which kind of proves its gatekeeping abilities hah).

p.s. love the username!