++ [ originally posted by Alex
] ++
Signature pics load up with every post, right? Say you have 20 post per page and everyone has a signature pic underneath. That means you're loading up to 20 additional images per page, with various sizes (they rarely very small) and it's a considerable additional strain on the server (whether it's the one carrying the site or another one).
Moreover they might not all load so you will have more broken images those times people have a too slow connection. Which again is ugly.
Furthermore the images distract people from seeing the post, I can certainly vouch for that. At forums that have signature images, I sometimes have to look for the text of the post to find it.
And finally, it's a real stretch for people with slow connections, like modems. As it is the site is not so friendly to those users because the pages are quite large but with more images it would easily raise the size by 30-50%.
Satisfied?