The real meat occurs a couple para further down under the head "Front-Paging a Node and in the following link, What nodes should/should not be FrontPaged? (and, in turn, Considering Front Paging a Node?).

Nuff' said? Well, here's a Readers' Digest version of my criteria: Front page, if and only if, the OP is a concise, well-formatted question which is clear and not a FAQ, and deserving (IMO) of an upvote! Be stingy with FPs when the site is busy -- generally, M-F -- and less so on holidays and weekends.

Most of what's beyond that is mere elaboration... and, FTR, I don't think I've ever FPed a thread solely on the basis of excellent answers. My theory is that visitors or newbies scanning the Front Page select what to read based on the question.

^*1 Update: Let it be noted, some of the content cited later disagrees with the quoted characterization of the folk reading the FP.

Thank you, ww, for that wonderfully concise overview - answer duly added to my personal nodelet :-)
A user level that continues to overstate my experience :-))

Fresh content on the front page is a good thing. We should be FP'ing more than we do. Though I'm not as motivated as I should be, these are the criteria that I try to use:

• Is there any reason it shouldn't be FP'ed?
  • Too long? (In some cases <readmore>...</readmore> tags placed by a Janitor can fix this problem.)
  • Too dumb? (You can't fix stupid.)
  • Unanswerable? (Too little information provided to get a good answer.)
  • Too off-topic?
  • Too poorly formatted? (Janitors can help here, but sometimes it's just too much work.)
  • Too little effort / research from the OP? (All too common, and not to be encouraged.)
• Can the question be upvoted by someone who is using voting conscientiously?
• In rare cases: Has an answer been provided that is so good, it turns a poor question into a good thread?

If there's no reason it shouldn't be front-paged, and it's worthy of an upvote, it should be Front Paged.

The reason that a fresh front-page is good for the site is because this is where the majority of people land when they arrive here. Landing on a page that hasn't been updated in hours makes it look like the site is stagnant. We would prefer that, in lieu of snazzy design, the content of the site appears engaging and fresh.

I don't worry about too much traffic on the front page, as long as it doesn't exhibit characteristics of posts that aren't front-pageable.

Which are bringing deeper insight or are addressing an urgent problem.

I.a.W. stuff which needs a spot on (IMHO).

Different people have different opinions about excellence, so it's a democratic process by people who earned enough XP to merit this power and responsibility.

I'm surprised what the "help"-pages say, b/c there is a different normative praxis.

I look for a question that is "unusual" in some respect, one that goes beyond a mere FAQ and requires more than a link to a prior thread or a perldoc page. That doesn't mean that I might not think about FPing a post that is incredibly stupid but has received some outstanding replies that are ingenious in how they point that out. :)

That said, if a question that would otherwise be thought of as run-of-the mill has generated some especially thoughtful answers I will FP it. But overall, I rarely FP something myself, relying instead on the judgement of other, more experienced monks than myself to do so.

When a node is “outstanding, timely, well-written and particularly relevant” in some way, and also reasonably short-enough not to occupy too much space on the front page.   And that is, as intended, your call/opinion.   I don’t particularly feel that we need to increase the number of FP posts, e.g. “for the good of the site.”   Just think as to whether the post deserves to be something that you will see on your first cup of coffee.