[manquer]

Why not? Buying stars is also a positive signal on commitment.

i.e. if the maintainer is serious enough to buy stars, is not in theory likely to spend time /money in maintaining /improving the project also ?.

Presumably he wouldn't just want fake users but also real users, which is a signal than a just purely hobby project, that is vibe-coded on a whim over a weekend and abandoned?

[kylecazar]

It's a positive signal for fraud and willingness to deceive.

[justcool393]

> i.e. if the maintainer is serious enough to buy stars, is not in theory likely to spend time /money in maintaining /improving the project also ?.

i mean if maintainers clearly spend much more time and effort on fraud than actually improving the project, why should I at all believe they would, let alone trust their judgement with regards to other things such as technical choices for example