I have probably just missed it twice searching for info on them, but can someone explain this forum’s star system?

I knew the boxlock and sidelock monikers were based on the number of posts and had originally thought that the stars were just a continuation of that system. But then I grew to three stars and didn’t know why, especially when some members with thousands of posts more then I had less stars. Then I went down to two stars and now most recently one.

So what do the stars mean?