This is the tricky thing about game mechanics. Yes, they are effective in creating goals, or at least things to strive for. For games, simply creating a goal (any goal) is often enough.
It's much more difficult to create the goal you want. Forum karma and votes need voting ring and vendetta detection to be even minimally useful. Pandering detection would be great, but it's a hard problem.
The only way to avoid pandering is to have a culture where:
1) People vote based on what they want to read, not what they agree with
2) People want to read things they don't agree with as much as things they agree with
Both of these are hard. HN is the closest general-ish forum I've ever found to this, but it's still very far from the ideal. There's still a lot of pandering that goes on. The pandering just isn't all you see, like it is in many other places.
StackOverflow is actually even closer, but this is because of the very narrow focus. People want to read the thing that gives the largest volume of correct information in a concise manner.
It's much more difficult to create the goal you want. Forum karma and votes need voting ring and vendetta detection to be even minimally useful. Pandering detection would be great, but it's a hard problem.
The only way to avoid pandering is to have a culture where: 1) People vote based on what they want to read, not what they agree with 2) People want to read things they don't agree with as much as things they agree with
Both of these are hard. HN is the closest general-ish forum I've ever found to this, but it's still very far from the ideal. There's still a lot of pandering that goes on. The pandering just isn't all you see, like it is in many other places.
StackOverflow is actually even closer, but this is because of the very narrow focus. People want to read the thing that gives the largest volume of correct information in a concise manner.