Reddit didn't (yet). Another tech focused community site did though... So I stopped participating in the community.

You can build quite an extensive profile of someone given enough post history. More post history means more details. Especially nowadays with LLMs it's trivial. This can lead to all sorts of issues. One is people I know in real life being able to identify me. Another is that through various means my account may be linked to my personal identity (e.g. through matching usernames or emails across platforms) and oppressive regimes (now or in the feature) may use my post history to take action against me.

On Reddit and Hacker News, I don't need an email address to sign up. But also I use SimpleLogin to have a separate email address per website/account. Quite necessary these days when personal data is leaked by some company or other every day.

Thanks, I was not aware. They seem to be guidelines, and not rules. I find my privacy and the prevention of anyone to build a full profile of me (especially how easy that is now in the age of LLMs) a bit more important than the vague concept of "fostering community". I am sorry.

I rotate accounts on "social media" (mostly Reddit and Hacker News, the others don't interest me) every few weeks or months to make sure not too much of my post history accumulates in one account. I would dislike it very much if there would be high friction to create new accounts. On the other hand my behavior is probably a major outlier.