I would just like to add my 2 cents (even though the decision has already been made):
Post count in order to access files is a really bad idea. If people only want the files, they dont care about the site at all. These leeches are constantly checking the site for updates. If they havent joined the site already, they probably never will. This is the reality of open-source. If you dont have mandatory posts, these people will get what they want (quietly) and leave. But there are others who will stay and (on thier own) become interested in the site because they share the same intersts as the rest of us. These people are the only ones worth recieving posts from. But we also dont want to make them jump thorugh hops either. If there ever was a post requirement, the right people would be put-off and go somewhere else, and the wrong people would flood the board with spam. Whoever said "the admins can handle that" you have no idea how bad this would become. They are already overworked without doubling the amount of posts daily (mostly to now read trash) and then also havethe fun of adjusting accounts. Its a negative effect all around. As a forum user, I dont feel like sifting through all the spam to read threads with good content. If I half the posts in a thread was spammers posting "cool." just to get post-counts, I would be less likely to keep up on whats new on the site. It would drag us all down, all to try to protect something we have all decided was 'free'.
I do agree on requiring starting an account to download files. For the average leech, this is quick and has no effect on the contributing user or the staff. But as mentioned earlier, those that join that share the same interests would be more likely to become contributing users in the future.
One other thing I would like to note: I have seen sites that do this 'post count' crap to get files or whatever. Most poeple go somewhere else before wasting thier time. But someone will post spam and get the files, only to offer it on thier site without the post-count requirement. We dont want that either.
