Some of them are not exactly idle: just a few hours ago I submitted a piece about an epidemic of "voice scams", AI boosted: the idea was that it is not simply "intellectually interesting", but important, urgent and pressing, and especially calling for the awareness of the community.
I have put some consideration on the matter to come up with proposals, but no good idea yet.
I meant that, remaining on the assumption that the users will upvote submissions thus determining the perceived degree of importance, the fast flow of the news makes important ones go lost. Extra mechanisms to facilitate that "somebody notices the important" should be there.
This said, other mechanisms that differentiate submissions besides user upvote are not impossible.
As said, I do not have good proposals at the moment, but surely if I come up with anything sound I will contact you and present the idea.