It's mostly just embarrassing and a bit onerous -- like we have to watch our behavior, just because we've accumulated a bunch of dang stars. Frankly, I wish Parallax would just do away with the star designations altogether. OTOH, if you want to see a system that's really out of hand, wander on over to http://www.perlmonks.org. They've got a point system that's based on upvotes and downvotes, among other things, with designations ranging from "acolyte" to "saint". And people take it seriously! Good grief.
I did the calculation to see at which post counts the stars changed, by looking through the forum membership list, and inferring the most likely boundaries -- I posted the findings in this post...
bomber
Posts: 297
Comments
Most people on most forums are sarcastic about it as it doesn't prove a whole lot other than he/she talks a lot.
see here for somebody who recently achieved another star:
http://forums.parallax.com/showthread.php?132067-Hold-your-accolades-please.
Hay; I resemble that statement!
-Phil
You should get a bonus star for that avatar.
C.W.