It only takes about 3 seconds to load the thread I want to open, which is why I said it's just a tiny bit slow. Bearable like all new things coming out of STS. I don't mean that in a bad way. This is definitely a positive step forward.

Question about the feed: does it refresh by itself with every new post or do I have to select "newest" everytime to see new most recent posts?

And I think blogs would be okay to utilize since you're putting forward functions of the forums.