Yes, Slashdot is "News for Nerds". But we don't come here to passively "consume" news. We come here to actively debate the news. That's what makes Slashdot different.
Not only can we all come here and read and then talk about the nerdly news, but as it happens often enough, the nerds actually making the news are members here themselves. From physicists and IT guys at CERN, Linux and other OSS coders, celebrity nerds, spooks at the NSA (they're posting GNAA trolls on their lunch break, and we all know it), university students working on some cool project, etc. etc. I can't count the number of times I was browsing the comments of a story, and one of the subjects actually involved crops up and joins the conversation; and you know, that's pretty freaking cool.
As a collective, we're the circus performers, the contributors, the commentators, and the critics, all at once. Where else do you find this on the net? Nowhere. As far as I know, Slashdot is unique in this regard.