Apologies if I’ve missed any official comments on this, but I’ve seen a few comments now suggesting this with a lot of positive feedback so figured I’d make a dedicated post!

What I personally think:

There’s a ton of attention on us right now from our #1 fan clubs, just waiting to “cheat the system” and wriggle their way through. With the current invite-only system, even if they got ahold of a code, banning them and tracking who they’ve invited is an easy task. Having open registration would eliminate that trail and make ban evasion a breeze, even IP bans could be bypassed if they had used a VPN while invite-only would take much more time and effort.

Of course (wo)manpower to approve all requests is a big hindrance, but I think ensuring a female-only space for the long run is a higher priority than automatic approvals and sheer numbers right now (quality over quantity). Like many others, I was a lurker on r/GC for a long time before actively participating beyond just voting, my views and opinions hadn’t reverted just because I wasn’t commenting. If people are interested in reading our content then I think they’ll visit regardless, and waiting even a few days for approval won’t make any noticeable negative impact.