I am very guilty of this myself.
A bit of a story, not sure if it is to my advantage but with all the honesty going around here (see darkxanthos) I might as well.
I'm stuck in one of the worst inspirational gaps I've been in for a long long time, and I'm trying to find the 'holy grail', a self-regulating community.
I realize that HN is to some extent set up to achieve exactly that, but given the number of people complaining about the neigbourhood going to pot it seems that there is some room for improvement.
So I find myself reading HN more than I probably should, but I hope it will jolt me out of my 'writers block' into a more productive phase.
Whatever the outcome I certainly learn a lot from hanging out here!