You can't force people to use something like a forum and expect quality posts. That is silly logic. While I enjoy both Reddit and GH, all this has done is bring the bad parts of Reddit over to GH in force. Someone should want to participate on their own simply to be a part of the community, not because they want some little keycap. People that simply want to participate just because, are going to be the ones that contribute quality posts to the community. I also feel like there is value in lurking. In many cases, starting off lurking is really where you spend the time reading up on everything and really learning tons. Forcing people to start posting after knowing mechanical keyboards existed for only a week just doesn't seem like a great idea. There are also people that just don't enjoy the social aspect of forums, and I don't really like the idea of forcing them to be like "everyone else" either.
If coordinated with the mods, perhaps a forum could be made where a post count/time limit was needed to post, and thus being able to post on that forum would be needed for sales. In the current state, the mods just got thrown under a bus it seems.
you are acting as if this is the effect we tried for
firstly, adding a post count is nothing new, clack factory has required both a post count and minimum amount of time registered on the site before for most sales
gh itself requires a minimum post count for access to certain parts of the forum
right now, we have a huge amount of demand for the product we offer, the rule was put in place to protect the community not destroy it
whilst we cant meet demand, we want to do everything in our power to ensure people within the community have the best possible chance
now, i understand post count is a bit of a ham fisted way to do this, and we certainly dont want to encourage spam, im sure there are plenty of people that invest huge time and money in this community that dont actively post, and it is certainly not our intention to not include people like that, this is a temporary measure taken until we can have a better system in place
rest assured, i am screening accounts, and people just spamming to hit 50 will be seen
we have a much better system planned for the next sale
for now, stop spamming, i will be speaking with hoff about this, and anyone who he himself deems to have been negatively affecting the forum as a direct result of this i will look in to, and take action on a case by case basis
and for everyone making such a fuss about this post count thing, get over it, this is a hobby, and its meant to be fun, from time to time we will have to make decisions that you may not like, but we are looking at the bigger picture, and whilst you may not agree with some of the things we do, we will always be doing it for a reason
nothing last forever, we are keyboard enthusiasts, this is all trial and error