A long time ago, when I got into forum software, using other software I was able to make it so the forum looks alive with threads and titles but when the user clicked to read the thread, he was asked to register.
I would like to do the same with discourse.
basically, allow unregistered users to see the forum but not able to read the threads
Do you guys think its possible to do without major modifications?
thank you for the best forum engine out there
Nikos
We do not support this functionality as we believe it is user-hostile.
It would need to be a plugin.
thank you Jeff for everything you have done for the community. I respect your opinion for being user hostile but I believe it would be benefit the growth of discourse forums in niche communities .As a founder I have seen how growth works and I believe that exclusive content is ethically OK until a community becomes a “community”.
On my own I used it from 1-2 years off and on and I believe that it was integral to the growth of the community for people to feel special in this internet ocean of reposted information. No disrepect and thank you so much for everything @codinghorror
What you can do, today, is create a category that is only visible to TL0, which is effectively registered users.
It does not solve the ghost town problem you are trying to solve but does work today.
These links may help you.
https://meta.discourse.org/t/only-users-can-read-the-reply-how-to-enable/37680
I’m trying to include a referral link in this post: https://forum.elivelinux.org/t/our-recommended-hosting-service/918 , where the link is: https://m.do.co/c/461c16290971
But aparently the link doesn’t shows when the viewer is not logged in, is this normal ? 
Note: I needed to set is a “pre-formatted text / code” in order to show the text of the link (which is not a real link, but at least works for now…)