The pool owner has cleared a cool 77 bitcoins from running the pool so far. Even if it costs $1000 a month to run, that's still a whole lot of money in a few months. Totally deserved, though; it's a great service.

Regarding the glut of immature and unexchanged coins, are the current reports accurate or do they over represent the quantity of coins attributed to each address?

For purely trading and sending crypto, btc-e is great. For anything involving fiat I generally stay away.