I (founder of PH) have the same question re: "Almost all of the people commenting on PH work for PH." You can see the list of people that are or have worked on Product Hunt on our about page (http://www.producthunt.com/about). ~95% of the posts and comments are submitted by people that don't "work" for Product Hunt.
aagha is correct in that we've limited the number of people that can post. If anyone could post a product to the homepage, it would be overrun with self-promotion and frankly noise, with the way it's currently designed. We're working on a recommendation system so that people in the community can refer others to join the conversation in addition to a new posting flow that allows anyone to submit a product to be curated by the community.
It's early days and I empathize with the frustration of not being able to comment or post on the site. We're working hard to open it to a larger audience.
We're working on a recommendation system so that people in the community can refer others to join the conversation
Don't you this just perpetuates the "bros" ethos? How likely is a solo entrepreneur in his mid-40's working on a web startup and plugged into the Digital Valley but unable to attend meetups in the city to get an email from someone in the community of your friends and their friends? I think the chances are low.
Perhaps you should allow people to request a membership. I tried to submit a cool startup I found to PH last week and quickly determined I couldn't. Before that, I'd been checking PH ever morning to see what was cool and out there. After not being able to participate in the community (or the conversation--you could easily moderate comments) its basically fallen off my radar and I've stopped visiting.
aagha is correct in that we've limited the number of people that can post. If anyone could post a product to the homepage, it would be overrun with self-promotion and frankly noise, with the way it's currently designed. We're working on a recommendation system so that people in the community can refer others to join the conversation in addition to a new posting flow that allows anyone to submit a product to be curated by the community.
It's early days and I empathize with the frustration of not being able to comment or post on the site. We're working hard to open it to a larger audience.