Ask HN: The future of HN

Since (at least) the beginning of the Internet, a pattern has repeated: A group forms and has a culture. Over time, others join and the culture drifts to encompass the larger group. Some original members resent the drift. This happened when the net grew outside of universities and government and when AOL 'newbies' joined who didn't understand netiquette. It's happening now with HN, evidenced by a wider range of stories, more aggressive comments and periodic discussions about what to do about it.

The forces seem to be:

1) A growing community will increasingly post (and upvote) stories about a wider array of interests.

2) The new non-hacker visitor will increasingly enjoy front-page stories and become part of the community, to post and upvote.

3) This has to result in a dilution of the site focus to 'general interest' with a slight hacker tinge.

Counterforces could include an aggressive policing of stories and aggression. This would have a diluted effect over time as new users outnumber the old, unless the votes of older members count more. It's also counter to the spirit of the net to police too aggressively.

The site could be categorised into hacker/business/general interest/etc.

The hacker community (or YC-funded core) could up-and-move to another site, possibly with an invite-only rule to block TC.

What say you? What other scenarios are there?