Not surprising at all, honestly. The incentive to farm stars is massive. According to the article, 10K stars can cost just $1K, whereas achieving those numbers

Not surprising at all, honestly. The incentive to farm stars is massive. According to the article, 10K stars can cost just $1K, whereas achieving those numbers organically often takes years of work, millions in R&D, and countless deployments. When this seemingly trivial metric becomes a key factor in unlocking capital from VCs, it’s no wonder people resort to shortcuts. In a way, the real surprise is that not everyone is buying stars.