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.

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.

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?

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.

Aah, interesting approach.

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

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?

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

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

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

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

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.