VC3 is not for profit - it's a place to discuss questions like these, not the answer to that question. Think of it as similar to a virtual "think-tank."

What is the benefit of leaving HN for another site/forum to discuss when you could just comment and engage right here where the question was posed?

For one thing, the problem of thoughtful monetization of social networks is a very large one, and Hacker News comments are not my favorite medium to conduct intellectual debate and analysis on large problems.

The community on HN is awesome for getting really nitpicky, but the audience for discussing these sorts of problems is only a small slice of the larger HN audience. I started VC3 as a community formed around a specific purpose (discussing "building meaningful community") specifically to try to build more engaging and valuable discussion, and I personally think that a smaller, closed forum of enthusiastic individuals is a better way to do that than a public general-topic forum.

There's a question in our FAQ [0] that goes into this in even more detail. Look for the header "Why is VC3 its own site?"

[0]: https://vc3.club/#faq