This has been explained various times in FAQs, etc.. Unlike most of the other forums, we DON'T automatically update users' statuses, but do it manually instead. For newbie -> member, the transition comes normally after 20 or so messages, but if the user is "obviously still newbie, but likes to post tons of questions", he will remain newbie as well to mark his real status. And this manual update is done about once every two months -- which means that even that you've posted 50534589043 messages, you might have to be 'newbie' for next two months until some of the admins goes through the memberlists and "promotes" users next time.
