Indie Hackers is now an invite-only community
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Love it.
Quality > Quantity
I already thought IH excelled at this before. Similar to Hacker News, you get thoughtful replies, not people just trying to gain more followers :)
I agree that IH has been and remains a thoughtful, insightful community -- but it's very welcome to see @channingallen taking a defensive action to help keep it that way. IH is fundamentally commercial -- and almost by definition everyone here wears (if reluctantly) a marketing hat of some description. Marketers gonna market, and if I were Chahhing I'd have keeping IH from descending into an endless stream of product promotions right at the top of my long-term priorities.
We're here to build a community and learn from one another, not use each other as fuel for short-term growth-hacks. +1 to this move, @channingallen!
Almost all of your posts here are links to your twitter
@channingallen 💡 That's a great idea and to be honest with you in order to fight spam I would even add a system where new comers cannot post a new thread but have to comment for example at least 5 or 10 times before on other threads
Like that you would destroy 95% of spam people/topics
Yes, stack overflow has a similar model
Yeah. But has also lead to a bunch of assholes on SO. I wouldn't be so quick to just hop on that bandwagon.
This is a great idea, and would make members more likely to engage as well as the is better filtering in the contents being posted.
Even Reddit has a model like SO.
Certain Subreddits do.
+1 on this as well. Hopefully, the invite-only signup will solve most of it. If not, this is the next thing to try.
Good idea. +1 to this!
Nice idea! I think ProductHunt used to (or still has) have a similar check, upvote/login three consecutive days before you could hunt a product.
What would stop spammers to seek/trade invite codes, though?
Personally I think that ever since the "link" posts were introduced, the discussion started to trend downwards.
Indiehackers shouldn't really be a place to promote blog posts, Medium articles or Twitter threads, even if it's somewhat relevant. Too many posts here just include a plain link without any description, discussion or relevant info.
I can see who's invited who. If lots of new accounts start spamming, I can simply ban everyone up the invite chain.
Cool. That's a good idea.
I would still recommend to do something about those empty threads that only include a link, since it doesn't encourage discussion and many people are just promoting their content without contributing to the community.
This isn't necessarily considered actual spam, but IMHO it doesn't help as well.
I don't think he's going to. I think the link only option is bad too but in the end its not about what me or you think, its about what works and doesn't work.
It's not about you or me, but if this community is only about sharing links, there's no value and no reason for anyone to be here.
I'm not saying this is the current situation, but it can get there or closer to that.
The thing is, "Spam" is a broad term. For me when someone posts a plain link to a their own Twitter thread or blog post with no context, it's 100% spam. (again, just my opinion)
They do this on /r/entrepreneur and then you get people just copy/pasting content with a link to the original post, which imo is just as bad.
Edit: Oh wow, I hadn't seen all the link posts on IH now. Spamapalooza.
I was thinking if a membership fee of $5 would filter out real hustlers from those who would just want to spam, but it may seem unfair to other people. Just my thoughts though..
$5 is nothing for someone who wants to spam, they would likely pay it. But well at least it would help the community 😁
yes & help them find more easily 😁
I also think that since links were introduced the quality inside the community itself has been going down and now people is using this to promote their content outside here instead...
I would be happy to pay a membership fee for the ability to turn link-only posts off.
Agreed.
+1 to this. I used to be a lurker here, and the contrast from Reddit/HN is what made me join. Plain link posts are a step backwards towards the other 'aggregator' platforms, which is not at the heart of IH
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My vote would be for a filter, so I don't have to see them.
@channingallen This is the best news I've read in this week! Thanks for doing this.
There were quite a lot of spam posts of people selling their services, real estate and what not. I welcome this change surely. Good work! ⚡
The nature of indie hacking means you may not be in touch with other indie hackers when you start out. I don't know how I would have got an invite when I joined.
How about a waitlist for people to join, where they post a brief pitch. Incentivise existing members to scan through the list and approve people (2 approvals to get in) - maybe this is a way to earn invite codes. If you approve too many spammers, you can't approve anyone for a year.
Sorry, my opinion may be outstanding but I don't get it. First of all, I don't get how it can prevent spammers from spamming, and secondly, how normal, new indiehackers will be able to sign up?
I don't think the goal of this is to stop spamming from happening, but rather to tone it down a bit. Whether it works or not we'll see in the next few days.
Yeah, maybe. I wonder though, how new indie hackers will be able to register?
With an invite code
How do they get them?
Say, I see in my profile that I have 0 invites.
Same here. I have legit people trying to join the community, but there's no way. I wish there were clear instructions on how to get invites.
I dont know. I guess posting a certain number of posts. I've posted several things since and still have zero invites. That would not be a question for me.
I realize I've been more of a silent learner/observer and less of a participant on here, but I think this is a great idea.
You wouldn't be here if it were invite-only, it's easy to like this feature when you're already part of the group.
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While I totally get the purpose and think it's a smart move. There is a mega chance I would never have got an invite since most people I know aren't really into indie hacking or even the concept. And I've got tons of value from this site even tho I mostly just lurk.
To be honest, I like the idea to fight spam, but not the invite only.
Because if i'm not indiehackers, and I want to join the community, how can I get the invit code ?
Clubhouse did that, many other companies did that as well, and it worked well. So it'll work.
But regarding the ratio signup VS spam, I don't know the number, but other tactics can be done :
Curious to see the results of this invit code process, if you can share the results in few weeks, that would be very helpful for anyone that want to create a community
Thanks
I agreed with this new invite only rule until reading your post, it does makes more sense to implement changes you suggested then to implement invite only registration.
That's a shame. I understand the need to fight spam, but I probably wouldn't have been able to join if this were in place when I joined. I knew nobody here when I first arrived.
Great move! But I found this community online, so if it were an invite-only platform with a limited number of invite codes, I wouldn't have even been able to join this community. I hope you get my point.
Well there goes my million-dollar "private indie hackers without the spammers" product idea.
Conversely you can do a 'Indie hacker community where anyone can join :D'
Looks like a had a nice gut feeling to sign up here the last weekend :P
Love the newsletters and the community here. Reminds me of the old warrior forum days.
I have mixed feelings about this idea as indie people should be able to get as much help as needed without the exclusivity - lets see
Cool move, as someone who hasn't historically been active on IH, it makes me more inclined to use the platform since its more of a privilege to be a part of the platform
That's exactly what's wrong behind the invite-only strategy
Same here. I just joined a couple of weeks ago and I feel even more lucky to be part of this community now.
Quality decision!
Great decision. I am waiting for invite code in my account.
Thanks a lot for IH,
The content here and the newsletters are very high quality.
You made pretty good job on fighting it so far, then i've seen none.
This is really not a good idea. Kill spammers through higher comment karma/post karma requirements (like subreddits do), not through invite codes.
Otherwise, there's a decent chance this is just permanently stunting the community's growth. I would never in a million years be able to get an invite code since I don't know anyone else who was on here when I first joined.
Great move Allen!
Excellent stuff!
Makes sense & will probably increase quality of posts.
If we share ann invite and that person breaks guidelines etc is there blow back on the inviting member?
Good Idea. We all hate spam.
I am in favor of this.
For anyone searching/ctrl-f for "how will this prevent spam":
https://www.indiehackers.com/post/indie-hackers-is-now-an-invite-only-community-2d8149aa5c?commentId=-Mg6_ShMekjDrWdl75ER
The only downside, is it may isolate new comers who don't have access to other entrepreneurs, or know where to go for resources.
I guess I jumped into the last train by registering 6 days ago
@csallen - this is nice. But for those of us who don't contribute (all the time), but have in the past, is there a reason I don't already have some invite codes to send out?
Great idea !
I'm just afraid that this will have a perverse effect: all the new members will only be "experienced" indie hackers, who already know others indie hackers (who have invitation codes).
Won't this initiative prevent "isolated" beginners (people who do not know anyone interested in development around them) from joining?
This is what we've all been waiting for for months!! Reason enough to spend more time on here again 🥰
That's easy to say when you're already in
Thank you @channingallen - awesome news
Neat, I think this is likely a welcome change
This is ok I guess. I joined 8 months ago and have been pretty active so earning invite codes may not be all that bad. It's sad that things have been bad enough for this to have happened but with popularity comes lots and lots of problems but that's expected with a big community like this. Anyway, that's it for now.
Awesome news!! I'm smiling (for real!).
You wouldn't say that if you were a bit late to the party
Always nice to jump to that phase of community building where digital bums on seats doesn’t have to be one of the primary focusses. 👍
Interesting move. I think this has always worked for other platforms, so why not for IH too!
Saying goodbye to a lot of spammers.
I think it's for the better!
Indiehouse!
Yes!!
Good Idea!! A report button next to the comment will be helpful. Lately, I am seeing a lot of spam.
Great idea! Makes me think of other use-cases directly too. Thanks!
Good move.
Great decision and would be interesting to see how it evolves. But completely agree that good quality discussions are always welcome.
Wise decision. Let’s see where it takes us.
This is a great feature. It stops spammers from spamming.
Good decision. This will hopefully reduce SPAM by a great measure.
Thank you 🙏
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