

Ask PG: No more new accounts at HN? - mayank

The option for creating an account seems to have been removed -- is this a temporary thing or a more permanent change?
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keiferski
You have to click _submit_ to find the account creation page. I'm thinking
that it's a subtle way by pg to slow down new signups.

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pg
In particular for spammers.

A few months ago we really cracked down on spammers. Anyone who looks at
/newest with showdead turned on has probably noticed the difference.

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lifeisstillgood
It's probably hard to tell, but I would assume HN is the _least_ fertile
spamming ground for miles around - we all seem to have fairly well tuned
netizen antennae

That said what if you turned up the requirements - for example a uuid in a TXT
entry on a domain. I would be surprised if 75% of HN do not already own one
and 90+ be capable of getting and managing one?

Presumably a throw away domain is more costly than a throw away email?

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jacques_chester
Links that reach front page get a good dollop of google juice, so spammers
target HN.

Likewise, anything I've posted on HN that even does well in comments becomes a
bit of a spam magnet.

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jstanley
Wow, I hadn't noticed this.

I really hope HN hasn't stopped accepting signups.

EDIT: In the unlikely event that signups are stopped forever, I wonder what an
account would be worth on the black market?

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crisnoble
It seems to me that you have a few options to create a new account.

1) Click add comment while viewing a comment thread. 2) Try to up-vote
anything from anywhere 3) Click Submit from anywhere

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27182818284
It was mentioned before to help cut back on spam / sudden rushes of accounts.
You must click "reply" on a comment for the prompt.

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justcreated001
Just created this account. Perhaps it is human error on your part.

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mayank
This is my login screen: <http://imgur.com/w8gLXmY> Upvotes on this story
suggest that others are seeing the same thing too.

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jstanley
Same for me. Even in Incognito Mode I can't see any way to sign up.

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kintamanimatt
For upvotes, submissions, and replies, the login page also has as a signup
form. However, there seems to be a secondary login page (linked to at the top
right) that has no such form as is shown in that screenshot in the comment you
replied to.

