Are you saying that Google ranks sites based on appearance?

They take immediate bounces into account, so if people bounce based on appearance then yes.

A high bounce rate is unlikely to produce the massive dropoff shelf in their traffic profile. They have likely tripped some flags and are getting a site penalty.

That's a big 'if.'

I try to avoid it because it looks like garbage. Even though the content is good, I feel the site is not authoritative because it looks like some guy's geocities page.

I agree that the design is a bit old-fashioned, but to me sites are about the content, so as long as I can get the information I want without getting a migraine, I'll ignore it. Authoritative comes from content, not looks.

In fact, to me MeFi and HN are about the same, design-wise...

Hacker news has a sane color scheme. Ask Metafilter has barf yellow on swamp green.

Sorry to be so blunt, but that's pretty snobby and I would be seriously concerned if Google actually used that criteria.

People click on the search result... and hit the back button right as they see the color scheme. This ruins the Google ranking of the site.

And people just started doing this mid-November 2012? Or Google only really started taking it into account then?

A lot of people have been giving earnest, authoritative sounding SEO advice, but I don't think anyone really knows except Google.

Right. Meanwhile, gmane and nabble float to the top of the SERPs. Give me a break.

The fact that Metafilter hasn't jumped on a bunch of javascript-heavy design fads over the years is one of the things I really like about it. Much like Hacker News, the site just works and doesn't get in your face with a lot of designer ego.

No reason to jump on "javascript-heavy" design fads, a simple refresh of the design to be more modern and usable would suffice. Even reddit is more appealing and visually straightforward for new users, and that site usually ranks pretty low for readability for new users unaccustomed to the design.