I don't think they are a pipedream for Nostr. Developers continually discuss having an algorithm store and/or creating your own for your experience on Nostr.
Discussion
I just don't understand the benefit outside of just managing your follow list & then have selective filtering.
Just being able to set easily basic shit like:
“Show me the 10 most zapped notes of my follows+2, since 48 hours.
Or
“Show me the 50 most liked post from my followers over the past month.”
Would be infinitely better than any blackboxed algorithm.