@quid (et al): Thank you for your very kind words, and for the show of support. However, I can think of a variety of reasons why I do not consider myself a good fit for the position, and so with some regret I feel I'd better decline. (I hope we can get someone who will accept!)

That's a good point. I think I would much prefer a moderator who has been familiar with MO for a few years and has paid attention to its (changing) culture.

Well, I'd like to thank @quid for responding, and glad he or she was understanding of what transpired in this discussion. Although I think the discussion was necessary to some degree, it can't be very comfortable to be a subject of frank public discussion, and I'm very glad quid seems to have taken it well within stride -- I appreciate it.

@fedja That thing I put in quotes was just supposed to illustrate what some person might think, not necessarily what I would think. But I do think that having people operate under their real names, with their public selves on the line, generally helps moderate against the possibility of their abusing power in some way, or just generally being jerks. (This person 'quid' isn't a jerk IMO, but people have indeed gotten annoyed with things s/he has said behind a veil of secrecy.) It's a public perception thing: I think it would go down much more smoothly if moderators were publicly identifiable.

Per Scott's suggestion, I will downvote each answer (but not the "question").

@AndrásBátkai The basic problem as I see it would be lack of transparency; making executive-level decisions while hiding behind a pseudonym is sure to be off-putting to many (maybe not you). ("Who is this guy 'quid', anyway, to delete my question?") Anyway, all this is moot unless quid were to actually accept a nomination.

I agree that quid is thoughtful (most of the time), but I also have found him (him?) at times to be unnecessarily argumentative. But overall I think he (he?) might be a decent choice for moderator -- if he were also to lose the pseudonym.

@user40280 I don't think this discussion can go anywhere unless there is first hard evidence presented for this alleged correlation.

I agree with Gerry. You should see some up the positively orgiastic upvoting from the early days. The tendency to upvote answers has gone waaaaayyyy down since.

I've nothing more to add, and don't know what to say. I've reported what facts I know.

I reeeeaaaalllllyyyy doubt it's some sort of subconscious reaction on the part of high-rep users. If there's something that's bumping the question to the front page, then people who hadn't seen the question before might be voting, pro or con.

If you want to know my opinion, though, I think your proposed explanation (the "psychological thing") is extremely unlikely for high rep users.

I am only reporting what I know, speaking as a user with 24.1k rep. I think moderators have tools I don't have access to which might enable them to track voting patterns. I'm not sure what you are seeing or what you think you are seeing. I see now that Scott Carnahan has also answered, in a manner consistent with what I know.

No, they cannot see anything of the sort.

On purely anecdotal grounds, my experience is that indeed the first one given often wins the big points prize. (This effect seems much more pronounced over at MSE, which I've been spending time at recently, and which seems insane by comparison -- people constantly racing to be the first respondent, and with never-ceasing questions continually descending like snowflakes from the sky. It's really a mess over there!)

My guess is that people don't like the downvoting suggestion. But I'm not sure.