(non-fiction) Internet Narratives (part 3); 3 ways to limit Comment decay

Not really part 3 but rather part four or five or more. I have a guest post by English and more versions of what is possible, to include a video game, the creation of fractal never-ending stories (check out my own ongoing project to create something infinite) and the possible death of life for writers like myself: the creation of programs that will write more (quality and quantity-wise) than us.
I've talked about the nature of narratives today in a reply to what Franzen was saying about the paucity of potential in the internet. Indeed, for anyone with a grain of imagination, there is much hope in what one can achieve with the internet (or the possibility of the connections within the internet's structures, after all). I will say that given what I've seen, there is very little good coming out of the narratives (contrary to what I said before... and again, from what I've seen). This is not to say that the potential isn't there, simply that it hasn't been realized yet. Also, the internet certainly provides much in terms of valuable information (though much of it, like scientific papers, is behind paywalls), but I'll focus on narratives (in this case comments).  I mentioned comments before and said that it has the potential to create much that's beautiful. Much of what we find entertaining in a comments section (and that makes them so addictive) is the natural flow of conversation between people. That comments are popular most everywhere in the world make me want to think that this is evidence of the inherent lean towards democracy in all people's souls (in this one facet, of course). But there is still something to be said for watching a train wreck and actually watching something that is not only narrative but narrative that enriches our lives. 
What can one say? There is yet an example that I've seen where someone either creates a great narrative through comments (that is, harvesting the best aspects of comments and laying them out for us to read in a way that would define them as deep or enriching), or a design in comments that does allows it to happen. It would seem that all comment sections have the potential to be good, but as soon as they are good, they become popular, and that's where they fail.
Many people seem to see this weakness, and so far none of the solutions have worked (that I've seen). The comment sections that tend to work are those with a bunch of very strong and right-minded (and always iron-fisted) moderators, strong users (in small numbers, though not too small) and without much longevity. Anonymity or having everyone post as themselves doesn't seem to help matters either way. Because as soon as word gets out that there is a comment section worth a damn, it will be flooded and soon the moderators are overwhelmed or the user base has changed so much that nothing good will come out of it but name calling etc. (there are many places that I love that have gone south recently, that is certainly one of the saddest things I've seen).
The more divisive a subject, the more likely this will happen. Given what we know about the strength of comments in influencing people's views, there is certainly the artificial shilling being paid for by those in power (on one side or another) as well as the inherent tribalism in those subjects and those most vested in them. As soon as a comment thread is not going one tribe's way or another's, they will flood the place and shout down any worthwhile discussion. 
On reddit.com [1] the situation is the same: upvoting and downvoting has only a slight effect on matters. If a subreddit gets popular expect a huge downturn in quality (shills will come through etc) unless one has strong moderators (and even then, this only really works for subreddits with a specific topic like askhistorians). This is all enough to make one an enemy of democracy and a friend of autocracy (yet to look at places without comments, or with a limited conversation, like the nytimes, and one can see that this is not the solution as it seems to kill debate in any form). 
Is there another way to get to improving comments? To making them more amiable to those deep narratives I mentioned (though I'm all for fictionalizing comments, mind you)? I would say that there are, and we merely have to think on them. First: having something like the restrictions that we place upon democracy is important. Moderators are needed. But since no site has the money to deal with the hordes that come through once popular, perhaps this can be done through laws enforced by algorithms (note that I'm diverging from the comments aspect and merely diving into how to get good comments). 
1) Voting up and down comments. First, a good comment section works when there's a community. We can certainly allow that to happen by merely requiring a certain amount of time for user before they can comment, and if so, only with severe penalties. Like reddit one can accumulate points when the community agrees or disagrees with what they have to say. I'll add something else: that one needs to add a few things here: probation if you go below 0 (assuming one has gained that much "value" to vote) and to punish someone, or downvote, should cost one 4 points (and you gain one point if someone upvotes you, or for time spent contributing in some positive way to the site, to include time spent actively reading—one can think of many positive attributes needed in a community).
This would help people think twice about that which they hate and wish to downvote. One could have it so that given time spent could mean a certain person's vote means more. This would skew a site away from newer.fresher ideas, sadly. So perhaps one could judge how many upvotes they want to give a certain comment or post. This would, again, skew the site towards those who can gather the most votes through inane things like posting pictures of cats etc (not that this doesn't have its place, but it does matter if one wants deep conversations that matter). There could simply be a judgement call in this regard, or a segregation of votes gained in superfluous matters versus those in more serious topics. Of course, this isn't a cure to any site's ills. 
2) Limit TribalismI would say another aspect that needs to be looked at and limited is tribalism (or hordes coming through to downvote that which they don't like, just look at any Israel-Palestine issue, or any others). This can be human nature as well as paid shills, but it exists. I would say another variable to be weighted is that of people coming through and voting one way to drown out new ideas. If people are known to interact, or to vote in pretty much the same way (in the same areas), then it can be said that if they vote on one thing (up or down) they cannot be allowed to have more influence than if two random people with not much in common vote up another point of view. Note that we can take time spent on the topic/site as another factor. This would help alleviate people just joining to push a certain point.
3) Limit troll accountsAbove I made the point that those who have tried to eliminate anonymity have not met with much success. Let's keep anonymity, but let's allow a limited amount (this would go against my attempts to see and create as many narratives as possible, I admit) of profiles to be created from a single IP address. Or perhaps ask for proof that there is someone behind the mask, but only charge a few cents to a credit card etc. This might help, though I'm not sure that it will matter as much as the opints above.

4) Another view: that of the wisdom of crowds.
 Again, this plays into the democratic (as well as market) ideal that imagine many people, like myself, tend to default towards. We don't like seeing that fail. So when we see the mob we wonder why it is that we're not seeing the effects of the crowd helping us move towards the best answer (or discussion) to a question. Well, it would seem that group think comes into play (and distorts the positive effect of a crowd's wisdom) much more often and easier than we think.

Thus one needs to see the current set up of comments (with or without up/downvotes) as incorrect and we perhaps need a way to allow someone to interact with a certain article or topic without the group coming into play. They can put in their comments without seeing anything else, but then we risk cutting all conversation off (a huge part of why some read comments). Perhaps then what we need is a time where there are no comments, and only what people have to think about a certain article/topic and then a wave of comments (which can then be voted upon with the above specifications) followed by another wave at another time and so forth. Threads would then be allowed after a certain time (or perhaps follow a natural course in this time-wave manner). Or perhaps we could figure out an algorithm to get the best of all comments (not sure how this would work at all).

 It seems that this would best create something from comments that would allow for the wisdom of crowds principle to prevail over other methods. It might end up looking completely different from what a comment thread today looks, but I dare say something better will come out of it.
Do you have any thoughts on the matter? Any better ways to set up something to minimize comment-decay?

[1] For example my most recent experience on reddit.com has been saddening to say the least. I've spent much of my time trying to curate some of the more nuanced articles or comments around. These usually get you nowhere. Especially if they go against whatever the accepted wisdom is. It would seem that there is a futility to deep talks or complex subjects (the reward here is either gaining a whole bunch of upvotes, or at least facilitating some level of a discussion). However, if one is to take the inane route (cat pics) or the path of least resistance, if we're going to deal with politics or geo politics, then the rewards will be multiplied many fold. Concerning the latter part, all one needs to do is to follow the zeitgeist and push the herd in the direction it's already running.
I recently posted an article about the heroics of some Iraqi against the barbarians de jour, ISIS, and was flooded with upvotes. 90% of all my upvotes, to be exact. That there might be paid government shills online goes without saying; however, that this would account for all of what I've observed doesn't seem as likely (not that I would be surprised to find this to be the truth, with the cloak of national security, our government can do whatever it likes and lie about it as well).
What does it say? It certainly says something about human nature, that need to push towards whatever way the winds are blowing, even when those winds are created by us. This is something separate from the internet, but the internet doesn't help matters. I wonder if the points I made above could help? There is limited information out there, and people tend to trust talking heads and politicians. I believe that we can still counter that, but we will need a lot of effort.

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