Screw all the questions above. I love the poster but not the post.
Lower. The. Fucking. BAR.
I don't mean so low that we are back in the gutters or anything, but come ON people. It takes way too long for gratification here. Back in the day the leveling structure made sense. Back when, you know, everything was actually about everything.
Now that we (I mean this in general terms) are all "picky" about what gets to stay and what gets to go, and ambiguous about even that much, it takes way too long for anyone to accomplish anything. Take a poll. How many users have been here a few YEARS and haven't felt a level change? It's too hard and we're losing a lot of potential people.
I know that the site is worth a person's time. After all I have been here for seven years. But welcome to the present, where you have a day, two at most, to really capture a "new user". I have more to say on this but I feel my breath is being wasted even trying.
We can't heal a broken arm with some pretty band-aids.
Disagree? Prove me wrong.
/rant off.