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I get the point of having a minimum reputation to use the new chat feature. However, I was hoping my 2K reputation from Stack Overflow would be enough - but it looks like I need to acquire 20 rep here on Meta Stack Exchange.
So my question is - should this restriction be moved?
Associate your accounts. You'll get +100 rep, and can chat away happily.
(This works because you have the requisite >200 rep on at least one site in our network.)
To actually answer the OP's question: the rep limit is helpful for separating out the worst of the drive-by users and bots, who would be likely to, shall we say, negatively impact the signal-to-noise ratio. As Marc pointed out, the bar for entry is set very low, well under even the 100 rep provided by the account association bonus.
So, while the limit is certainly a pain for legitimate new users, the benefit outweighs the cost, and the restriction should not be removed.
