Comment by joeblau

It's interesting you posted this because I was just thinking about posting an Ask HN to see what things people would change or want to make better. A lot of people seem to believe that newer users are ruining the culture. TechCrunch also had an issue with spammy/trolling behavior in it's comments until they implemented Facebook comments which sort of provided accountability. Another method could be an invite system, but I feel like I would have never been able to become a contributor if I needed an invite.

I've gained a lot of useful information on HN in my past two years as a user and I hope I've helped a few a long the way as well. I do find myself skipping over a lot more posts, especially during the whole Snowden fiasco. I don't know how it used to be "back in the day" but I wish I could have experienced it.