I read the other day a New Yorker's article [0] about the 2 Hacker News moderators and how lonely and emotionally draining their work is. Here rapid growth and anonymity lead to people being more ready to give fast feedback or opinion which sometimes causes bickering, misinterpretation and insults.
So a thriving network has to have:
- The right mix of a moderate velocity and growth - just enough new content so it doesn't turn into a ghost town or echo chamber, but not too much so the quality is not diluted.
- Self-moderation or non-stop moderation if necessary.
- The right incentive built around a common interest for the users to create meaningful and constructive new content - seems like the hardest part.
[0] https://www.newyorker.com/news/letter-from-silicon-valley/th...
It's quite interesting making tweaks to a social website, as there are usually all sorts of unpredictable second-order effects. I have a bit more respect for why websites like Twitter don't change much.
On Indie Hackers in particular, one thing I've noticed is that people tend to be kind without much moderation. My leading hypothesis at this point is that almost everyone has skin in the game. You're less likely to bash someone else's project if you know you'll be posting about your project soon, so norms have developed around being constructive and encouraging.
By contrast, HN has a norm around finding fault with whoever you're responding to, which is great for informative debate and conversation -- I learn a lot here from reading so many different opinions on each issue.
[0] https://www.indiehackers.com