 Why not make people pay using karma points for each submission to HN?
makecheck: I wonder if this wouldn't work better for voting:Subtract 1 karma from yourself each time up-vote or down-vote is used; this effectively turns karma into "money" that can be spent on maintaining good discussion and high quality submissions.This would make people think twice before down-voting.  It would also reduce "knee-jerk" up-votes, as people would be more likely to reserve up-votes for things that truly deserve it.It would also mean that long-time users will naturally do more of the moderation, as they have lots of points and may not be as afraid to use them.