Whilst i was always a fan of darker forums (reading in the dark, on my monitor, was a frequent if bad habit, and dark forums helped relieve the pain of black on white forums). TF2maps was one of the few sites that did light colours well. The baje-orange colour was enough that the light and/or saturation didn't obliterate your eyes.
This forum didn't need to turn to black, it's a forum design fad that we have no need to follow.
edit: Also, clicking someones name brings a drop down menu of avialable actions (PM, view public profile etc). It still appears in the original forums colour.
edit2: Also, someone mentioned the sig space is actually larger with that hider icon. This is too true. Posts also arn't actually smaller as a result of the lacking sigs, it's just small-to-moderate posts with large blank spaces underneath. Or large posts with the "hidden" icon and a blank space where the sig would have been.
edit3: also also, i find my eyes drawn to the space between the avatar and the post contents/under post contents. Rather than the posters name and then post contents. Which is just odd.