As I type this there are a couple of diaries on the rec list.
One of them has 4 recs. The other has 5. There's a third with a mere 8.
Folks with a memory for minutia will know that I'm a frequent critic of whatever inscrutable algorithm the weird gears of the DailyKos uses to (ostensibly) "reward good writing". I know things get slow in the summer, but three rec list diaries with single-digit recs has got to be some kind of record. And the most glaring indication yet of just how broken the rec list concept has become.
I'm sure people will have differing opinions, but I think it's really really REALLY time the staff reconsiders what amounts to one of the three most featured places in "the community." We don't get that good writing anymore -- it's become a reward system for the most emotional manipulation that can be packed into a diary. And now you don't even need that many people to feel it's valuable to get one of the twelve most prominent spots that present the community to the larger world.
The rec list also strikes me as the place where the most divisiveness is sown. This is a separate aspect, which probably deserves it's own consideration, but it is related, so I thought I'd note it here. None of us enjoy flame wars... (well, some of us don't enjoy flame wars, I guess) ...and the rec list seems to be the source of most of the kerosene. For the health of the site and the community I really wish to advocate an examination of the situation.
OK, sure, not the most important thing we could be talking about...
UPDATE: OK, perhaps this has more to do with bugs than with faulty formulas -- This diary instantly appeared on the rec list with a single rec, but showed up three rec list pages deep, and the counter shows negative 1 new comments.
UPDATE UPDATE: Thanks to those who responded. I've gone with the conclusion that what I saw yesterday was the result of ghosts in this here machine, rather than severely ill-conceived design. In the end, it comes down to this: in a community with active participants in the thousands, it ought to take more than under a dozen or so people to make something so featured, no matter how slow things are or what time of day it's published. Whether this happens by design or by error, it ought to be looked at.