You need to keep clicking in order for the "time spent online" to be incremented - so whilst it can take a while even if you spend only an hour a day on the forum then provided that you are actively clicking on numerous topics (rather than just leaving the webpage sitting) it shouldn't even take a week to have accumulated the required time (am pretty sure it only took myself a day).
I get what you're saying, but an
hour a day just to be able to post to a forum? Not all of us have that kind of time to spend on a single website.
This is the same way I feel. I actually am just less inclined to stay on the forum now because of this. I only wanted help in another thread and now I am basically forced to say random crap in different threads to get to the (admitantly easy) post requirement and have to stay around for 4 hours. I mean really, what the hell is there to do in a newbie forum. Im guessing the 4 hours is to get you to join in with the community but that sort of stuff should be after we are able to post.