This directly applies to hacker news readers - if you read about a successful or even a failed startup founder, do you read that submission because it was usefu

This directly applies to hacker news readers - if you read about a successful or even a failed startup founder, do you read that submission because it was useful and educational, or because it had a compelling story in it? There is a large group of people who don't do startups but only think about doing startups. Since they lack the requisite experience they will upvote what looks compelling and inspirational to them, rather than what's useful or representative (the latter looks dull and muddy). And since this majority will upvote the sexy narrative, the rest of us will end up reading it. It's what I call "a narrative tar pit" and it's why I never look at the front page, only at the RSS feed. Frighteningly, at some point a random sample of submissions is bound to produce more useful reading material than the front page. It would be even better if I could only see stories upvoted/commented by a couple of people here whose taste I trust, but whose names I will not call out to avoid another stampede. I hope that pg considers this modest proposal.