I seem to recall reading an interview where this question was asked, and the answer was basically, don't mess with what works....the idea being that, if you're constantly improving, eventually you'll screw something up. He knows it's bad, but he doesn't want to screw things up.

But I agree with you, the design is painful to look at, and usability could be improved a lot. Why he doesn't clean things up a bit is beyond me.

But then, compared to the competitors, POF may not look so pretty, but functionally it is quite good.