And the squares are not the same thing as stars. I believe the only way to see the stars is view the member profile.
I never knew about the stars. I just discovered that you can see them by hovering your mouse over a poster's name and clicking the drop-down arrow.
Curiously, if you find (somewhere under "my controls") the list of the "twenty top posters", you will see that certain old geezers have five stars, including Michael (not that he's an old geezer), Ray, Dark Penguin, Rob C, and yours truly. However, the following all seem to have no stars: JonathanWienke, BernardLanguillier, Mark D Segal, Digitaldog, BJL, francois, JackFlesher, Wolfnowl, and several others. This list includes many of the most knowledgable and informative posters on the list, IMHO.
The "squares" make at least a little bit of sense, but I can't figure out the stars.
Eric