They cite cost as the issue, that only 2600 users represent half of all comments on their entire system.
I don't know how much they are paying for a third party to manage their comment system, but I will bid $500/month to handle those 2600 users comprising half of all comments, or $1000/month for all comments. All inclusive bid. I can get this tiny number of users running on a pretty modest system.
My proposed system will also save money on subpoenas and moderation overhead by not storing ip addresses and not having paid moderation.
Have you factored in that you need to serve the comments to every user, not just ones that comment? I mean, to be fair, you could probably serve staticish chunks of HTML and update-on-new-comment, but it's a consideration.
I don't know how much they are paying for a third party to manage their comment system, but I will bid $500/month to handle those 2600 users comprising half of all comments, or $1000/month for all comments. All inclusive bid. I can get this tiny number of users running on a pretty modest system.
My proposed system will also save money on subpoenas and moderation overhead by not storing ip addresses and not having paid moderation.