The discussion revolves around introducing more nuanced group visibility levels beyond the current four. tophee proposes this feature to allow group members to apply for membership in sub-groups without making those sub-groups public. This would cater to use cases such as associations with thematic working groups or boards with sub-committees. Carla_B expresses interest in this idea, as it could benefit the group she is working with, which may have multiple groups with varying levels of privacy.
How about more than the current four visibility levels? Probably the most frequent use case for this would be to allow group members to apply for membership in sub-groups without having to make those sub-groups public. So let’s say you have a group for all members in an association, then those members (and only those) should be able to see various thematic working groups or what have you, either as a matter of transparency or in order to make it possible for them to join those group. Likewise, those in the board group would be able to see various sub-committee groups etc.
If I’m not mistaken, currently the only way to allow users to apply for membership in a group is to make the group public.