On one hand, spammers can easily create accounts beforehand.

On the other hand, it might discourage legitimate new members posting for the first time, like when they notice their work is highlighted here, or a long time lurker who feels empassioned to respond to something.

Spam doesn't seem like that big of a problem right now. Between green names, downvotes, flags, and @dang, I think we generally do a good enough job of filtering out and preventing them from floating to the top. I'd rather have a few bad ones get through than dissuade someone new who's earnestly trying to post.

New accounts are already subject to extra restrictions. I'm reluctant to raise that bar. I fear the risk of excluding legit newcomers more than spammers and trolls, who are ever with us.

> throwaway green accounts for drive-by snarky comments, spam, astro-turfing, etc

User flags on such posts are extremely helpful. They help by downranking and/or killing bad posts, but even more by providing a high-value signal for software to classify future posts. When you flag posts like that, you're not just cleaning litter off one city block, you're training the street system to deal with future litter automatically.

This only works to some extent (bad actors will always create new accounts), but the extent is considerable. If you care about HN, it's a valuable way to contribute.

I'll add to this: for truly egregious or prolific abusers (spam, misbehaviour, etc.), both flag and then email the mods at hn@ycombinator.com

(You don't need to do this for garden-variety stuff, but if you see something going above and beyond, it can help.)

I've done this many, many, many times, on all manner of issues. Dang almost always responds within an hour or so, rarely more than a day. Quite often the issue's already been dealt with, either automatically (HN's more complex than it appears), or by mod intervention. Occasionally (and increasingly since I've tightened my own criteria for reporting) I seem to be reporting unrecognised abuse. That's not because the abuse is more common, but because I'm reporting issues less frequently and after additional checks, e.g., looking for previous mod admonisments.

You can check for this past history using the "replies" endpoint, which can show where a particular profile's had direct responses from dang. For myself, e.g.:

  https://news.ycombinator.com/replies?id=dredmorbius&by=dang

Keep reports brief and specific. Link directly to relevant content or profile(s) within the body. If you're reporting on content, include the content ID in the email subject as this apparently makes processing reports much easier.

E.g., the content ID for dang's comment above, URL:

  https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42570159

Is "42570159" (the digits at the end of the URL).

You'll find similar contentIDs on all submissions and comments.

You might be surprised to find out that such a change has quite limited benefits. Many people will simply create their throwaways in advance, only to pull them out once the waiting period has elapsed.

Yep, this. I've actually noticed an even more sinister trend where accounts that are exactly 14 days old will automatically submit an extremely offensive or misleading story, simply to take advantage of their lack of green name. These accounts typically have no other submissions or comments, just a link to some spurious website and engagement-bait headline.

Can you link to some examples?

Here's the problem: Sometimes a topic comes up like, e.g., child abuse. And I'm reading the comments, and I think, hey, I want to say something about my specific experience of how I was abused as a child. (I wasn't, for the record - this is a fictional example.) But I don't want the account - no doubt personal, perhaps quite graphic, maybe not fully processed even yet - to be associated with my main account, especially if my main account is in my actual name or has my contact info. Maybe I'm not ready to talk about it publicly in a way that can be traced back to me.

So I need a throwaway account. But if I have to wait 3 days, the conversation is over, and nobody will see my comment.

Professional spammers most probably have a collection of aged accounts for the platforms they work on.

However, there are a number of other techniques based on behavioral analytics or IP/email reputation that could detect and block spammers. The age of the account is just another metric we use in the rule engine, but it should be used independently to avoid spoiling the experience of readers who have converted into new writers.

Not advertising, but our team has just open-sourced a user analytics platform that could help exactly with this.

May be. But a lot of new account for comments are also for insight on certain topic or subject that they are bound by their job and dont want to use their real account.

I don't know about that - but I would like to forbid submissions until you hit 50 karma points, so you can demonstrate that you actually contribute to HN instead of just using it has a soapbox to promote your own content.

Arbitrary anti-abuse rules typically have limited upside and significant downside.

HN already has a lot of anti-abuse baked in, much of it highly dynamic, and as dang's said here, largely based on member-based actions. Downvoting and flagging content really does work, even if it's occasionally slow (a few hours to accumulate enough flags to down a comment or new account).

If that's not fast enough for you, or you see a newly-emerged problem, email the mods at hn@ycombinator.com, with a clear and concise statement of the problem and links to examples. More on that in an earlier comment, including some research tips:

<https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42571073>

Most of the time I've reported spammy or abusive accounts they've already been marked as such within the system. Maybe one in ten seems to be novel.

I sometimes make throwaway accounts to speak my mind that I wouldn't dare to do on a pseudonym account as this one. I haven't done it a lot, as there are many things I feel comfortable sharing on this account. But I recognize that in a very few instances, my opinions are quite extreme or unpalatable. I think most people tend to have a few.

I create those accounts to share those opinions to understand and see how they are received. To my surprise, 50% of the time, they are received extremely well and I really need to do a check on how the world works. The other 50% of the time, it'd go exactly as how I thought it would go.

So, for me personally, I'd be against it as I learn a lot about it.

Moreover, I've seen other throwaway accounts do the same. Sometimes these comments tend to be upvoted a lot as while it is spicy, there's some strong resonance there among the HN crows. Often times, it's also downvoted into oblivion. I feel like I can differentiatie it compared to the standard snarkiness, spam or astroturfing. I find both the upvoted and downvoted versions valuable as I appreciate candor.

Well, what's your suggestion for n? 3? 5?

3, as per comment.

Autoban all new accounts, require their comments to be vouched up until they earn some minimum amount of karma or they pass out of green account status. Also re-ban any account with some a high ratio of flags and downvotes vs upvotes.

Metafilter.com charges $5 for an account, so that's an option.

What's the quality on metafilter nowadays?

it's just the internet

just flag those comments

turn off the computer

touch some grass