Link Squirrel was originally a list of links that were uploaded by myself and other random people. It was originally a public list of links that anyone could add to. When each link was approved it was added to the public directory of links. Links could be viewed in one big list or you could split them up into categories.
While the original version of Link Squirrel worked well and had a lot of links added to it (some of which were approved) it had to change for 2020. The original website was like the original uploader.net website in that it was an exercise in creating a publically accessible tool that may have been useful. However, if the website could have been useful in 2007, it would have been much less useful in it's original format in 2020.
So, it could have been re-built as it was originally but it was basically a flawed concept in 2020.
I didn't like the idea of having a publicly accessible list of links I would have to maintain but maybe there was a useful website here somewhere.
With having various computers and devices in various locations sharing links between devices could often be tricky without syncing the browsers. Searching for and getting a useful link on my phone or work computer, I'd have to be quite creative to get the same link on a computer without searching for it again. There are browser extensions that allow someone to keep the list of tabs open on various devices and there may even be extensions and other websites that do this. There are also things like Trello which make it easier to keep notes on things, including links. But maybe this was a good use for the website.
Having a website where I could login and access my own list of links as a reminder of things to read or action is useful for me. However, if having public users adding public links is problematic, so too is having users upload private links. I wouldn't want the fairly simple functionality to be used for purposes it wasn't intended for. There might be a scenario where someone could upload links then share the login with other people for the wrong kind of purposes.
So, the solution is to turn off registrations and to just have this as a private place where I can post links to the technical articles I'd like to read when I have time. This means that I don't have to worry about the type of links stored by other users, or what those links are used for.
Because it's only a personal website it means I can see how certain things work without worrying too much that I'm going to crash a live website. This is particularly relevant in terms of the deployment process. If I wanted to play around with a new kind of deployment process for Laravel, this would be the place to do it. Because it's a self-contained website that is not affecting anything else and is backed up in Git, I can really do whatever I like to it.
In future, this policy may get changed but for now I'm happy to have this as a personal website where I can try out new things and experiment.