Earlier quoted context omitted.
Robot9000 really didn't improve quality in the places it was deployed though and people just game it. edit: that said I think Something Awful arguably has the best approach to this does it not? The site is over 20 years old at this point. That is absolutely ancient compared to all the public message forums that exist.
SA is also not the font of internet culture that it once was, either, so clearly the price of admission is not sufficient to make it successful. It seems to me it was, at most, a partial contributor.
My point is that maybe what SA is now is the best you can hope for on the internet, and it's going strong(?).