Hide visibility of Forum for anonymous users

Product Support

AI-generated summary

The discussion revolves around the idea of hiding the forum’s content from anonymous users. Shawnpinto proposes this to encourage users to create an account and engage with the community, as anonymous users tend to view the content without signing up. Canapin suggests three site settings that could achieve this, and Shawnpinto expresses interest in the “login required” option.

However, Jagster raises concerns about this approach, questioning why users would create an account without knowing what they’re getting. They also point out that lurkers are not necessarily a problem, as they don’t contribute much content anyway. Additionally, Jagster asks if the content is exclusive enough to warrant blocking search engines.

1

Hi everyone,

Not sure if we have this yet, but do we have the option to disable access to Community for anonymous users?

Use case -

  • We want to keep our content exclusive to members.
  • Anonymous users tend to see the information and not sign up.

Thoughts:
If we were to hide the content on the forum and keep a pop up/CTA for ‘Join the Community’ - we think users will create an account → engage.

2

Hello Shawn! :slight_smile:

There are three site settings that may suite your needs:

invite only

All new users must be explicitly invited by trusted users or staff. Public registration is disabled.

login required

Require authentication to read content on this site, disallow anonymous access.

must approve users

Staff must approve all new user accounts before they are allowed to access the site.

3

Ah! Thank you @Canapin :grin:
I like the 2nd option - Login required, exactly what we wanted.

Thank you so much!

4

Why would or should they do it? Sure, this is kind of age question and matter of genre, but you must answer two questions (to you, not for me because I’m not interested :wink: ):

  • why would someone buy something without seeing what they are buying (aka. Why would an user give email address to you; they don’t know you)
  • why are lurkers so big issue in the situation where about 2 % of users create 90 % of content (aka. What is the real reason why you want to get registrations/emails)

And the last one: is content really so exclusive you want ban search engines?