Karma?

Looking at your submissions - while interesting, wouldn't warrant up vote from me. I tend to up vote as a sort of bookmark or if I feel something should get more exposure (try to drive it to the front page). Posts I up vote are generally related to cool projects / projects that could help me in my work or discussion topics I feel strongly about.

There is definitely a target audience that is the HN community - so while something might be interesting, it doesn't necessarily mean it might be popular - ie: theres a lot of posts today about the Tesla Model 3 but few up votes if any on any of them because it's all speculation until it actually happens.