There's no need to analyze the text. The answer will be in _who_ is doing the upvoting and downvoting. I wouldn't even look at the author, just the voters.
Google's Pagerank didn't have to look at the page contents to understand which pages are higher quality. At Quantcast, we categorize related content based on who is visiting, no need to look at the content itself.
The best way to find out is to open up the HN data, in either a closed or open research project. I'd help fund a closed Kaggle competition with NDAs if that's whats wanted. Just consider it a way to learn what works. pg himself would be the final arbiter and likely implementor of what works.
Google's Pagerank didn't have to look at the page contents to understand which pages are higher quality. At Quantcast, we categorize related content based on who is visiting, no need to look at the content itself.
The best way to find out is to open up the HN data, in either a closed or open research project. I'd help fund a closed Kaggle competition with NDAs if that's whats wanted. Just consider it a way to learn what works. pg himself would be the final arbiter and likely implementor of what works.