You've exposed some systematic weaknesses of the SO quality score. If I worked for SO I'd thank you. My proposed solution is to manually identify X judges who

You've exposed some systematic weaknesses of the SO quality score. If I worked for SO I'd thank you. My proposed solution is to manually identify X judges who represent a nicecross section of programming backgrounds. These judges are selected by their continued support and passion for helping programmers. Over time their upvotes would create new quality judges in an intelligent manner. I used a system like this for characterizing 3D shapes in the protein database (kinase). The templates were created from known kinase chains, we called them motifs. Thanks to Tony Sommese, and Jim Dwulit for really making it happen (I just helped out on that project). Another case for this model is crystal formation. Seed crystals allow for fractal like formation of patterns in supporting media dishes. Googles voting system also relies on "reliable" sources to help judge the value of links. Reference papers use citations to determine how close an author is to a renowned scientist.