The stars are probably legitimate.

It's weird that most people in these comments are speculating fraud.

Why aren't companies with real money to gain from stars gaming the system to the same degree? Why do the other metrics - issues and pull requests - match up with its popularity? Why would the bots starring the repo mean that those same bots are not popular? Those bots are controlled by their users.

The project is extremely active because this is what everyone being able to customize their computing looks like. A mess.

But it's a good mess.

Github was the old code sharing model clearly not designed for this. I'm sure a new model for code sharing will come to fix the growing pains.

A ton of people who would have never been able to customize their computing experience are finally able to. And it is magical for them.

This means that those same people will finally value having access to source and use of open protocols.

It was always valuable to us because we had the power to make it matter. It never mattered to them because they did not. Now they do.

The last era of computing was defined by dumbing down computing for the masses. Less information, less customizable, and more metric driven. Control in the hands of the companies.

This new era will look more free/libre, more personal, and less enshitified. Control in the hands of the users.

This is a very positive development.