Community Names Shouldn't Be First-Come, First-Serve: A Better Way to Handle Generic Topics

The biggest flaw in platforms like Reddit is that generic, "root-level" community names (like r/skyrim, r/windows, r/hotsauce, r/wholefoods) are handed out on a pure first-come, first-served basis. Whoever grabs the most obvious, broad name first ends up controlling the de facto central hub for that entire topic. Because of algorithmic and search/visibility advantages, no serious alternatives (r/skyrimalt, r/windows2, etc.) can ever gain real traction. Everyone flocks to the plain-name version, giving that one mod team (or often a single powermod) near-monopoly power over discussion on the topic.

This leads to real problems:

- Arbitrary, lifetime bans shut people out of entire topics forever. I got banned from r/windows after a disagreement with a mod over a Windows 7 post—now I'm permanently locked out of the main Windows discussion space for the rest of my life until I am dead. The same happened to me on r/hotsauce over a meme that offended a mod. One person's mood swing == lifelong exclusion from the generic "hotsauce" conversation. Reddit's rules even ban creating alts to bypass subreddit bans (risking a site-wide ban).

- Corporate subs like r/wholefoods, r/kroger, r/aldi, or r/target often get claimed by employees who turn them into echo chambers of complaints, toxicity toward customers, and hostility to anyone asking innocent questions about products, sales, or policies. Customers just want info; instead, they get gatekept or attacked.

Why should one user (or small group) be allowed to "claim" an entire broad topic like this and wield unchecked power over it?

A better model —- especially if a platform like the relaunched Digg wants to genuinely differentiate itself from Reddit's worst flaws -— would treat generic/root topics as public "rallying points" rather than privately owned fiefdoms.

Core idea:

- Generic names (e.g., /skyrim, /windows, /hotsauce) become open, unownable community spaces. No one "owns" them or can ban users outright from the topic itself.

- Moderation shifts from traditional bans to personalized curation and muting. Anyone can set up as a "curator" for a topic: they maintain their own mute/block lists, tag/filter content, and define rules for what they promote or hide in their feed.

- Users subscribe to the curators they trust (or mix multiple). Your view of /skyrim becomes a blend of the rallying point's raw content + your chosen curators' filters/mutes + your own preferences. Disagree with a curator's heavy hand? Unsubscribe and pick another—or go raw.

- Shared/community mute lists could exist as opt-in layers (e.g., popular "low-toxicity" lists everyone can layer on), but the key is decentralization: no single mod can exile you from the entire topic forever.

This keeps open discourse alive while letting people avoid toxicity without creating walled gardens or dead-alternative subs. It turns generic topics into true commons instead of personal kingdoms.

If Digg (or any Reddit competitor) copies the same first-come, first-served subreddit model, it'll just recreate Reddit's powermod problems, echo chambers, and arbitrary gatekeeping. To actually improve on Reddit, they need to break the "one name = one owner" paradigm and build something more open and user-controlled.

What do you think -— does this approach fix the root issue, or am I missing something?

This is sort of a repost of a post I made yesterday where I failed to articulate my point.