Yes, I've noticed this quite a lot recently, that somebody posts an article that become popular, soon after there appear 'secondary' articles which seem to be trying to ride the same wave. It could be genuine, but I also suspect people just quickly knock up 'follow up' articles to get the traffic. This almost always seems to happen when a new PG essay is posted.
How could the quality of HN be measured? (very Robert Persig!)
So we are relatively stuck. No algorithm change, no UI change, increasing volume of submissions and few people upvoting - means most articles that bubble up are link-baity.