Thanks for putting this out there. I for one, don't even read the trending pages, because, with some exceptions, its unappealing and rather frustrating. Seeing a shallow article make thousands, while some are begging for pennies, is enough to demotivative anyone.
One thing I think would help is a NON trending tab. We have a way to see all the articles that are taking off, but no real way to see the ones that haven't. I would prefer to read prefer to leaf through potentially quality posts that missed the rocket ship, rather then scroll past the same old un provoking articles on the trending page that have already made more on one article then 50 quality posts that never got a good chance to be viewed will make combined.