Part of that though is that +1 Funny doesn't add to your slashdot karma. So people sometimes "upvote to denigrate" because you can only get +5 anyway, a silly comment can get +5 Funny without actually rewarding the commenter (mocks the comment) - you can see this when replies get +5 Insightful or +5 Informative and are very contrary to the original comment.

Personally, I like the idea of having qualifiers on the downvote without one on the upvote - makes you think a little bit before downvoting... plus the vote buttons are ridiculously small on an mobile Safari - so having to click twice would prevent accidental downvotes.

So far, while it may not be ideal, I think HN actually hits pretty close to the sweet spot.

thanks i'll check it out. I wasn't thinking to show the stats to others, possibly to provide feedback to the poster that they're 'above average' on the 'mean' or 'not relevant', etc scale.