HN: 33K visitors = 32,500 random tire kickers. But it also = 500 new hackers

Just a thought about the recent surge of traffic from Coding Horror's link. It's true that things like this can threaten to swamp HN with an "Eternal September."

And making the front page boring is a very amusing defense against the random hit-and-run tire kickers. But let's not forget that 33,000 new visitors will contain a few potential hackers.

Sure, most will say "Erlang, WTF!" But a few will say "Erlang, What the... Wow!!!" It would be a shame if HN lost its way and suffered from the tragedy of mediocrity that has poisoned reddit and other sites. But it would also be a shame if folks with lots of good stuff to contribute stumbled upon HN and found it repellant.

I guess I'm just trying to say that while we should be very aggressive about keeping undesirable content and poisonous commentary off HN, we should also be careful to make sure people know that the door is wide open for like-minded folks to join in and participate, no matter where they came from.