I think people need to be rewarded somehow for reading and voting on stories on the new page. If everyone has to develop a cabal to get to the front page, then

I think people need to be rewarded somehow for reading and voting on stories on the new page. If everyone has to develop a cabal to get to the front page, then over time the size of the cabals will have to grow because of the increased competition - eventually squeezing out the little guy, no matter how good his content is. With an active userbase on the new page cabals would be less likely to form.