The simple reason is the prohibitive pricing for pro features. Down the road we will need control over authentication, so that we can roll in more interactivity on our website (premium content, interactive and community features).

Disqus offers this feature for pro users, but at $300/month its just not feasible. As a media site that hopes for small 4-figure revenue monthly, $300 is just way outside our budget for a third-party service like this. It would need to be more like $30/m to be in the ballpark really.

I guess we aren't the people they are targeting, but i hope Disqus considers a much lower tier with single sign-on and without some of the other pro features (we aren't interested in analytics, can live without realtime, theme editor, priority support). I wonder how many other "pro-bloggers" and "small businesses" (2 things listed under 'who is this for') are alienated with the high pricing.