[sn9]

If it was the trajectory you're talking about, it would have stayed off the front page after you saw it down lower in the ranking.

There's a lot of stochastic behavior in the ranking of posts based on when people see them and how many of them upvote or comment. Always has been.

[mandmandam]

Ah, I thought you were referring to this story as 'the snapshot' and HN as a whole as 'the trajectory'.