Apologies for going a bit meta, but that would make a pretty good rating scheme for comments on here - DH6 through to AH6...

I wonder if pg considered this: replacing up/down arrows with such a scale (0-name calling, 1-ad hominem, etc.) to force users to think about what up/down means every time they vote.

That's very similar to Slashdot's moderating system, which I think is great.

Uhg. IMHO there's a reason Digg and Reddit (and it's HN offspring) grew to prominence and it's partly due to Slashdot's confusing and archaic moderating system. I've been visiting for years and still don't fully understand, or care to decode how the system of moderating and nested comments works.

Along with pointing our which HN rule was violated, how about adding some meat to the debate in order to demonstrate the type of post HN encourages? Such as actual readership/traffic numbers for the WSJ.

For example this news piece claiming WSJ numbers are up after Murdoch took over: http://www.businessinsider.com/wall-street-journal-readershi...

I'm not saying the news story is accurate, but it does contribute to the conversation whereas the parent comment and yours do not.