The mere fact that you took the time to compile this lengthy response and have received meaningful responses is evidence enough that HN has not "jumped the shark."
It is a people problem, but I feel the biggest problem is that people are pointing out that there's a problem. Communities evolve; that is, in fact, practically all they do. Perhaps HN isn't the same as it was 2 or 3 years ago, saying that it's worse is a bit of a stretch.
I've yet to find a community where people have meaningful discussions in the comments without some snarky response like, "lol wut"." On HN these comments are self-moderated; those with the karma downvote the meaningless comments and they disappear into the aether.
Simply put, I don't think HN is dying. Rumors of its demise are highly overblown.
I agree, to an extent. This navel-gazing tends to precede a noticeable and rapid decline in quality, as the community becomes too focussed on itself, and less upon content and discussion. I've only been on reddit for just over a year but have noticed a marked decline in quality just in that time. Around this time last year, there were many discussions about reddit's declining quality and what's to be done about it. Now, about half the posts on even my heavily-culled front page are talking about reddit itself, half of the rest are using absurdly editorialized headlines, and there's a smattering of good content here and there. Heavy moderation seems to be key, as the mods quite simply don't seem to care anymore.
It is a people problem, but I feel the biggest problem is that people are pointing out that there's a problem. Communities evolve; that is, in fact, practically all they do. Perhaps HN isn't the same as it was 2 or 3 years ago, saying that it's worse is a bit of a stretch.
I've yet to find a community where people have meaningful discussions in the comments without some snarky response like, "lol wut"." On HN these comments are self-moderated; those with the karma downvote the meaningless comments and they disappear into the aether.
Simply put, I don't think HN is dying. Rumors of its demise are highly overblown.