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They have (or have had) developers on staff to assist Matt. It was originally written in ColdFusion (to be fair, the site has been around since 1999), though I imagine it's moved onto greener pastures since then. The look of MeFi is iconic, much like Slashdot, so any radical changes to its design would likely cause more problems than it might solve.

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Sure, I don't necessarily mean aesthetic changes, but - particularly when you've developed a strong community - there's often a resistance to modifying a core offering. That benefits the community but also often begins to erode your ability to attract new users.

It's a difficult balance, no question.

Sure. For what it's worth, though, we've continued to see steady signups for years and years; the concern over the ossification of a conservative site design is a reasonable one and one we chew on plenty, trust me, but as far as that goes we haven't all else aside seen active new-user interest go away.

Any other efficiencies to be gained on the technology side?

If the userbase is steadily gaining, it seems like monetizing that traffic should be inherent and profitable unless the infrastructure is inordinately expensive.

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