The merits are the recognition that what the person says/does is useful for the readers of this community, whether that person is legendary or not.
I think that in the last six months or so we had maybe 5-6 submissions and that's what he (probably) meant when he said that no one needs/wants merit anymore in our local board anymore as thread used to be way more active 3-4 years ago when me and other members were going through ranks. Its sort of unwritten rule in that topic not to submit your posts once you reach Legendary rank and since majority of us reached that and we don't have many new members, thread became inactive.