Stars certainly influence how people perceive a repo. If there are no stars, then I'm less likely to look at it. The problem is that it's also a catch-22. If you have a lot of stars, more people look, and more people star. It's self fulfilling, definitely not a perfect system.
I find people often over simplify things like this. Sure, free trade is good. The issues is that we've never had a free trade deal. Our "free trade deals" come with thousands of caveats where we are the partner country agree to all kinds of rules, regulations, etc. I think true free trade would be the best, but failing that I think straight-forward protectionism is better than what we get now with "free trade".
This seems pretty neat, but is it even legal? At what point does something like this become an actual crime (unauthorized computer access)? Sending fake data seems like automated hacking.
Don't get me wrong. I like this. I think that tracking and pervasive analytics are a net loss for society.