Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is what I want to happen although I know it never will. Communities used to be spread out across the internet on individual sites that were maintained by enthusiasts as a hobby. I found the interactions among such communities to bar far more enjoyable. Once any community reaches a threshold of users it starts to get unpleasant.
I think the other thing that made forums a better place was the absence of a upvote/downvote system. It reduced the motivation of just chasing attention with little jokes and threads could stay on the front page so long as there was active conversation going on.
There's nothing terrible about downvotes as such if they are done right, but this is one thing Slashdot did right: you can never be more than +5 or -1 on any post.