This topic is both valid and respectable but somehow it has deteriorated into a shameless excuse for racking up post count totals. If that is all anybody here wants to do then why doesn't somebody just start a topic called bump?
I myself like post counts but it is these kind of shennanigans that wrecks them for everybody. If it is possible I wouldn't mind if the post counter was changed so that it only counted posts that have more than 100 characters in them, or some other limit, that way people are less likely to spam all over the place just to drive up their totals.
It might be really good for the forums because then the people who strive to get high totals will be motivated to make larger posts in order to do so. This would add a lot more substance to the messageboards and eliminate some of the fluff making them even more fun and intersting then they already are.