But as the author pointed out, nobody visits /new.

Maybe not the /all/new but I pretty much only visit /new on the subs I frequent. It's a much better way of using smaller subs from my perspective. Lots of things never make it fully to the front page of a smaller sub. The drawback is that subs which get caught in a filter appear to show sorted by their submission date and not the mod approval date so you can miss things on /new that might make it to /hot

> Maybe not the /all/new but I pretty much only visit /new on the subs I frequent. It's a much better way of using smaller subs from my perspective.

And one of the reasons might be that sorting doesn't work quite properly on smaller subreddits?

Even if this features didn't exist, something I find interesting but most people don't care about is still easier to find on new.

Not just easier, but actually only possible to find on /new.

This is the right answer. I do this too, because when everything is <10 votes with a few outliers, /new looks close to /hot, but there are more submissions. For subs where the front page changes not hourly, but weekly, it's the only way to get a little freshness.

Lots of people visit /new. They're called "knights of new". The total number of these people is probably far lower than the front page (where _hot is used), but it's how every submission gets its start.

Then how do any links get non-zero scores?

Via longstanding glitches, clearly.

Because posts start out at 1.

Lots do. At least two reasons, I can thinks of, 1. If you are a regular to a sub, new will act like RSS feed. You know what to read and where to stop. 2. If you believe in reddit karma, better chance of your comments to be recognised. By the time it hits the front page, more or less it is a comment muddle.

I always visit /new. I don't think I've ever visited /hot.

/hot is the default for subreddits.