As a low-rep, but growing (or am I already med-rep?) contributor I only partly agree.

• I worry that first page users will get "burnt-out".

Actually, I worry more that some of you guys eventually get your thesis done and no longer have the time to contribute here :-)

(On the other hand I am pretty sure that new grad students will follow you. So I agree with Joseph that a community-wide 'burn-out' is unlikely.)

• I worry that newcomers who are a little slow and careful in writing their answer will feel up-started.

Yes, that might happen. However, in my experience the downer is not so much the speed, but the fact that an even less detailed answer by a high-rep user tends to get more votes than a carful answer by a low-rep user. This is perfectly understandable (people just trust high-rep users and "automatically" up-vote their answers), but can appear as unfair.

What I consider as important is to generously up-vote answers from low-rep users.

As a low-rep, but growing (or am I already med-rep?) contributor I only partly agree.

• I worry that first page users will get "burnt-out".

Actually, I worry more that some of you guys eventually get your thesis done and no longer have the time to contribute here :-)

(On the other hand I am pretty sure that new grad students will follow you. So I agree with Joseph that a community-wide 'burn-out' is unlikely.)

• I worry that newcomers who are a little slow and careful in writing their answer will feel up-started.

Yes, that might happen. However, in my experience the downer is not so much the speed, but the fact that an even less detailed answer by a high-rep user tends to get more votes than a careful answer by a low-rep user. This is perfectly understandable (people just trust high-rep users and "automatically" up-vote their answers), but can appear as unfair.

What I consider as important is to generously up-vote answers from low-rep users.