Yep, 15 posts turns you into...Guardian, I think.
Guruship started back in 2003. I wanted to reward the best of the analysis forum, so we held a poll. It sort of failed, so I just resorted to hand picking a few members. Originally, the Guru of Life (Aitrus) was renowned for remembering the plots with great detail and discussing many subjects. The Guru of Time (warmgun) contributed much to the Axioms and Corollaries article (predecessor to Principles of Time and Dimensional Travel), and the Guru of Reason (GrayLensman) was the exemplary jack-of-all-trades.
Here's the write-up on the About page:
Gurus are members of the Chrono Compendium recognized for outstanding individual contributions to analysis, the Chrono Compendium, and the popularity and enjoyment of the Chrono series on whole. Guru status is reserved for the highest possible achievements in individual fields; existing Gurus become emerita upon the promotion of new courts. For types of achievement, Life is reserved for creative, Time for analytical, and Reason for analytical and miscellaneous.
Court I - Aitrus (Life), GrayLensman (Reason), warmgun (Time)
Court II - Aitrus (Life), GrayLensman (Reason), The_UnknownUser_ (Time)
Court III - Aitrus (Life), GrayLensman (Reason), Leebot (Time)
Court IV - Geiger (Life), GrayLensman (Reason), Leebot (Time)
Court V - KWhazit (Life), Chrono'99 (Reason), Leebot (Time)
Since analysis is basically done, Guru of Life is now a sort of fan project or general community recognition rank. Leebot came back, so we didn't change Time from its roots in temporal analysis. Reason became the general catch-all for analysis and participation in all things, as Chrono'99 / GrayLensman were keen on modification, analysis, community projects, and fan fiction.
Still, the Guru system sort of made me nervous, because I felt like giving the status to some but not all contributors is a little elitist. So I've tried to reserve it only for amazing, wonderful stuff. Geiger made an invaluable contribution with Temporal Flux, and KWhazit followed it up with the CT Retranslation. If Chrono Crisis is finished, it'd be fun to make Chains of Fate the next, as Crisis would spark a lot of interest and vitality in the community.
"Retired" Gurus (basically, those who go inactive, since active ones keep the title) are given "Emeritus" ranks. Since KWhazit hasn't been to the forums in months (presumably he's busy with other stuff), I should probably just shift it back to Geiger...really, these Gurus ranks are cursed. Everyone they're awarded to seem to fall off the face of the earth.
I've thought about at least making some kind of public group thing, with many options such as "Dalton's Deceptive Diaspora" or "Magus's Shadow Mystics", which any forum member could join and get a special title with. It'd solve the problem of having unique community status apart from post count. We'd have to limit the options, or we might end up with a lot of 1 member groups. And we'd also have to find an SMF forum hack to allow this sort of thing.
