On discourse people are given a trust level.
This is the systems automated way of vetting people to prevent spam and have users help self moderate these forums.
When you first join you’ll be a level 0, you can read and reply, but you won’t be able to post links or PM users. This is a spam and bot prevention measure.
The system prioritizes reading more than posting to boost you to the LVL 1. At the moment the requirements to reach LVL1 is
- enter 5 new threads
- read 30 posts
- spend 20 minutes reading.
Once you’ve done that the system should bump you to level 1 rather quickly.
The higher your level the more you can do,
LVL2
- can edit your own posts up to 30 days after posting.
- can invite others into a conversation in PM
LVL3
- Can recategorize/rename topics
- flagging a LVL0 will auto hide their post
- posted links will show link previews
- enough lvl3 flagging a lvl0 will silence them for admin intervention
LVL4
*honorary admin, can edit posts, close topics, auto hides posts when flagged.
If your interested in more details about the levels their requirements and what they allow please check out this blog post from discourse. -> https://blog.discourse.org/2018/06/understanding-discourse-trust-levels/