Orion is a Kagi product, and Kagi is an AI company made to look like a search/browser/T-shirt company.
I have to assume a lot of people don't understand how deep the AI rabbithole for Kagi goes, because I have seen people recommend Kagi to people frustrated with Google's own AI bullshit... They're launching AI features left and right, and they have fully bought into AI being the future of search.
The biggest criticism I have seen of announcements-only signal groups is that every member can see every other member. This might be inconvenient for members who use their single phone number for purposes outside of activism.
It looks like they're just searching for people who will respond positively to their foregone decision to add the Shopping tool. I don't know how else to read that post, especially with how the team is interacting with the responses.