Seems many loudspeakers go more for WAF then performance and cabinet material choice show this.
Absolutely. That is fundamentally what the majority of audiophiles plonking down $5K on a showpiece really want. Most are not aware of the colorations and many prefer teh colored sound (what they are used to hearing and expectations are everything)
Ports are of use dont toss the babie out with the bath water.
For sure ports have their merits especially large ones tuned very low can add little coloration, however, if you want to get fanatical about coloration simply take a look at the ort response from prototypical small port bass assisted design speakers from most Stereophile measurement plots and you will often find what is audible port output (distortion above 1%) up as far as the lower midrange.
In the context of extreme measures to reduce cabinet distortion it makes sense to talk about ports also....so WHY does the article ignore this? IMHO, since none of the discussion is breaking much new ground, it seems to be a very selective discussion clearly intended to be marketing material couched as science and technology.