Not his problem, and not a particularly significant downside if he doesn't follow through. A better response for you would be to upvote articles you think are better HN material.
It is 'pgs problem if he wants HN to stay good. This requires more people NOT upvoting shitty articles and upvoting good ones. The problem of HN is that equally-ranked votes dilutes signal.
Once you have enough karma, you can flag articles. It's my understanding flags are not equal weighted with votes.