The counter-intuitive point to me was that registration keeps out good posters while not limiting bad ones. But wow, yes, it's consistent with the SSC "asshole

The counter-intuitive point to me was that registration keeps out good posters while not limiting bad ones. But wow, yes, it's consistent with the SSC "asshole filter," concept where poorly enforced rules mainly reward rule breakers and directly disadvantage people who follow them. The emphasis on conversation over points seems smart, if still gameable the way search engine optimization games them with links. There is another incentive I think we've seen come to the fore since this was written in 2009, which is that crapflooding forces moderation, which creates governance, and this centralizes oversight and reduces the number of people you need to pressure to control the forum. No new divergent or decentralized forums can exist very long because it costs states and political parties themselves almost nothing to subvert it and install, or compromise, moderators and governors who can be leveraged to use the forum for their messages. I can't help but suspect the flood of porn, spam, racism, and hostility you get if you leave any method on a forum open is at least partially driven by political operatives who poison your archives, and then when you fix it, they can say, "hey, so you're the one responsible here, we need this favour from you, and if you don't give it to us, we are going to make sure your name is synonymous with all this content we may or may not have posted. Such bad luck."