Eh, the problem with this idea is everything appeals to the lowest common denominator eventually. All subs (and even HN) would fall to Sturgeon's law if lead to its logical conclusion.

Smaller forums in the past tend to deal with this by having some groups that were strongly moderated with a strict set of rules and no/low tolerance of them being broke. Then more 'general' discussions where the rules were lessoned.

What he wanted was a community with a specific theme and purpose. What he got was a bazaar of randos showed up to share softcore pornography.

If a bunch of people showed up tomorrow on Hacker News, who mostly wanted to discuss Pokemon, they'd probably be shown the door. I don't see why a person running a subreddit shouldn't be able to do the same thing.

They wanted the clickbait and trash.