Texrat: a gift? By whom? Like what?

More: I understand Valerio's point that karmas are useful in communities. This is why I proposed a karma system for maemo.org in 2007 and this is why I'm still noting that most of the tools we are using in maemo.org and will use in meego.com have traditions of karma generation.

But then, in maemo.org karma has got always some (strong?) relation with the expectation of getting a free / discounted / loan device. This is something that generate uncomfortable, distorted or even childish situations. You have seen it and I have seen it to the extreme.

In MeeGo, with more device vendors and a higher potential to have a bigger community, this combination can get really uncomfortable, distorting and perhaps even more childish.

This goes again back to the karma per tool but without mixing tools and karma values. If I love bug reporting I see the incentive and usefulness of having a senior rank in Bugzilla. If I'm into open source development I see the point of Ohloh statistics putting me near the top of the crop. If I'm into forum discussions then I see the incentive of being distinguished as a senior commenter.

But... what is the point of mixing all these stats, in a single and quite arbitrary value? Please answer.

What is the message? That I am more contributor than you because I'm lucky that blogging is overrated compared to app downloads or git commits? Please answer.

What is the final purpose? Is it the distribution of devices as an incentive or is it something more. Please answer.