Not exactly the most eloquent criticism, but I do see what the OP is getting at. For me, HN has gone from a daily read (too much noise, hit-or-miss quality), to a weekly scan of http://news.ycombinator.com/best - which is generally pretty good. Techmeme is my daily scan for news, which I can go through in less than a minute with Instapaper as my procrastination shield.
Another trick I use is to check the submitter of really interesting stories and see what else they are submitting. I find many users' submission more interesting then the HN front page and even best. Like pg himself for example.