You can have a separate forum, but you don't need a separate account. You just need need these different sites to talk with each other. This is how email, Usenet and now ActivityPub works.
> People are lazy and want everything in the same place.
It doesn't have to be the same place for everyone. For me (and my friends and family), the "place for everything" would be the server I set up for them. For you, it could be a different server. For journalists from a media outlet, it could be an institutional server.
Also, stop projecting. Instead of hiding yourself in the excuse of "people are lazy", just say that you are lazy and don't care about giving your freedoms away to faceless corporations.
> Running a forum is a full time job. Need to handle DMCA takedowns, deal with illegal content, think about ways to monetise the site and so on. It's much harder than simply moderating a subreddit.
This is the key principle behind the idea of "Small Web". Your servers will be serving your immediate circle only. By definition, you would be only dealing with content created by people who you actually know.
- By not having to deal with thousands of users, the setup and maintenance is minimal.
- There will be no problem that you can not solve by just picking up the phone or knocking on their door and talking with the person directly.
- There is no need to "monetize" the site, because the operating costs are negligible and you are doing it only for yourself/your close circle.