I consider that to be a bright spot in this post. What would a performance comparison for this very specific app prove? The way I read it, the only goal of the rewrite was a more easily maintainable code-base with performance that was "good enough". It sounds like he was successful in meeting that goal.

With that said, comparing Python and Erlang on the basis of performance is a bit like looking for the world's tallest midget isn't it? Performance isn't the point at all, within a certain threshold.