I was going to say I'm surprised this is a topic, but then I saw who posted it. The way ranks are distributed out on Ultimate Shinobi is through members seeking permission from a Kage or an Administrator in order to obtain a rank higher than a Genin, with Kage's generally having the free will to give out ranks to whoever they wish and Administrator's holding the power to give out both village ranks and nukenin ranks. Certain factors are taken into account when deciding whether a person should obtain a rank or not, such as their current activity on the site, activity in the past with previous characters, creativity and also village choice among other things. If a village currently holds too many high ranking members, then we advise the Kage of said village to restrain themselves from handing out anymore ranks, to which they tend to follow.

In case Kage's are abusing their powers and handing out ranks all willy nilly or being bias in their approvals, then Adam and I, as Administrators, are able to revoke ranks handed out by Kage's and also able to take the role of the Kage into question. This has never happened before, as it's never been a problem before and I fail to see how it's a problem now. We've also set a system up now where if members who have received permission to create a Chuunin, Jounin or Nukenin, then they have two weeks to have a complete application posted up before their approval is revoked.

The very idea that Kage's are in fact abusing their power can be seen as quite insulting to the three people who are trying to hold a professional standard on US. We do not give out ranks to just anyone, ranks are earnt afterall.