How can I replicate Slashdot like news site using Drupal?

Please excuse my newbie question. I know this can be done using the Story Module, but needed some tips and advice to better manage it.

1) Do you know of any slashdot/techdirt like sites based entirely on Drupal
2) How can I enable community moderation or which is the best module to levearage community moderation
3) How to create subdomains for features like taxonomyname.mysite.com or forums.mysite.com
4) Shall I use 5.x or 6.x which is best suited for replicating the slashdot clone. Any advantage or using the previous 5.x modules or shall I go for 6.x hoping that there are no module dependencies or misses while creating such site.
5) Again which is the best module for community tagging

Thanks in advance
kamal