Either the demographic of /. has suddenly changed, or Dice isn't terribly interested in what users want. Moving the polls to the front page is gratuitous at best. Actually, it makes the polls harder to find. I would say it reduces their usefulness, only they never were useful, only entertaining.
Someone else commented on the video section. I have trouble imagining anyone on /. wanting to watch videos on this site. Am I wrong? Hmmm......just because I'm writing this comment, I went and looked at three random videos: one with 0 comments, one with 25 and one with 29. So a few people, but nothing compared to the normal stories.
Then the apparent conflict of interest demonstrated by the delayed SourceForge articles. The whole Beta mess that just won't die.
I think recognize the symptoms, because I've seen similar things happen elsewhere. This is what happens when the marketeers and bean counters take over a small company. The marketeers want to try out all their fancy ideas, without actually bothering to understand what their actual customers actually want. We need tweets? Social media? How about Vine? Look, pretty! One bling-filled idea after the next, while the users wander away to SoylentNews, PipeDot, or wherever. Meanwhile, the bean counters are only interested in short-term results; the phrase "long term" isn't even in their vocabulary. So they give the marketeers free reign, in hopes of getting those quarterly numbers up. Certainly the concept of a money-spinner that doesn't need changed never enters the minds of either group.
Dice killed SourceForge years ago with crapware - this latest is just tossing dirt on the coffin. I suppose they've sucked some short-term cash out of it, but it's long-term value is now essentially zero. Looks like /. is following along nicely...