taken from the announcements forum: "For every topic you make, you will receive 3 points. For every post you make, you will receieve 1 point. For every reply your topic recieves, you will receive 1 point. You can also receive points for contributing to neofriends.NET (with programs, ab lists etc), and if you gain enough reputation, you will be moved up to level 2 and receieve a large amount of points. Do not post/spam short posts in order to gain points. Any users who do this will be suspended or banned from the forum."