A related post recently came on reddit about subreddit forking. While not directly related to your suggestions, it may help in providing another framework on how reddit operates.
An observation made is that after sub reddits hit a certain mark, say 16000, they go to crap - at which point the subreddit goes through a cycle of subreddit drama and then splits off.
The post above is a great description of the process, filled with history to back it up.
r/pics serves as a pit to absorb a lot of the Karma whoring, and then branch people off to other sub reddits where more targeted communities exist to either absorb more Karma whoring, or to create a place with high a S/N ratio.
The r/earthporn and other sfwporn branches, as well as /specart, imaginary creatures and other picture related sites are forks which help maintain the holy SNR.
r/adviceanimals for example though was meant to reduce 'noise' (meme spam) in its parent (r/pics) and ended up being its own subreddit.
Making it easier to discover, will likely hasten the degradation of SNR - as it stands now, people discovery is easy, and primarily requires inclination, allowing the communities to self select.
Let me see if I have it ... here: http://www.reddit.com/r/TheoryOfReddit/comments/shv9y/how_wo...
An observation made is that after sub reddits hit a certain mark, say 16000, they go to crap - at which point the subreddit goes through a cycle of subreddit drama and then splits off.
The post above is a great description of the process, filled with history to back it up.
r/pics serves as a pit to absorb a lot of the Karma whoring, and then branch people off to other sub reddits where more targeted communities exist to either absorb more Karma whoring, or to create a place with high a S/N ratio.
The r/earthporn and other sfwporn branches, as well as /specart, imaginary creatures and other picture related sites are forks which help maintain the holy SNR.
r/adviceanimals for example though was meant to reduce 'noise' (meme spam) in its parent (r/pics) and ended up being its own subreddit.
Making it easier to discover, will likely hasten the degradation of SNR - as it stands now, people discovery is easy, and primarily requires inclination, allowing the communities to self select.