Perhaps instead of point totals, put a comment into a limited set of categories or some such.<p>Popular     -   &#62;= 10 votes<p>Interesting - 3-9 votes<p>Contributor - 1-3 votes<p>Neutral     - no votes<p>Unpopular   - -1 votes<p>Detractive  - &#60;= -2 votes<p>And show those instead of points or votes. Karma could still be calculated normally, and the votes could be used internally for thread sorting.