My guess is advertising. HN is their exact demographic / target users, and if you check the front page of "classic" HN where only old accounts can vote: http://

My guess is advertising. HN is their exact demographic / target users, and if you check the front page of "classic" HN where only old accounts can vote: http://news.ycombinator.org/classic http://news.ycombinator.org/classic It's gone. Someone gamed this to the front page