Now we need the quasi-obligatory response that this is really a government problem, and if government weren't in there mucking about with needless regulation the free market would address the problem and we'd all be in broadband utopia at reasonable prices.

Alliance, n.:
In international politics, the union of two thieves who have
their hands so deeply inserted in each other's pocket that
they cannot separately plunder a third.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"

...when it became known that the US were bugging her phone. Probably her reaction was "What's the hubbub, it's not like we don't...".

We've come a long way. Apparently domestic spying on people and sniffing in their private life has become common enough that we consider it a surprise when someone has the outlandish idea that the executive should first get a warrant for it...

Now someone could build a usable beta page and we can finally get rid of the turd!

C'mon, /., even MS eventually got the hint about Metro...

I'd guess governments around the globe would suddenly and for the first time agree on this needing to be eradicated IMMEDIATELY.

Simple self interest.

"Same" being quite relative here. If you define same as "no additional cost" and "similar/same user experience", I'd dare say every contemporary OS but MS Windows...

Nope. Imagine this: Your ISP redirects ALL your traffic, no matter the destination IP, to the one IP of the machine that tells you that the extortionists want money from you. There is very little you can do at this stage except hack and take over said machine.

Also ISPs would not willingly put up with something like that and try to push back. Word spreads quickly and people would just as quickly start to move away.

That's the whole reason for the spiel. That the whole thing is standing on SUCH thin ice that in the meantime every judge and their dog knows that these carpet bombing filesharing accusations don't work and throw the whole thing out before the John Doe lawsuit is filed in full.

That's the reason for the extortion. People get inconvenienced and asked for rather little money. It's likely that they'll just pay, ignoring that this also seems to admit guilt. It's like a weaker form of torture, just instead of skinning someone to make them admit guilt, you take away their beloved toy.

There's just one way to find out for sure. Anyone got a shotgun?

Well, pooling the 20 bucks 75k people should have enough money to hire a pretty good hitman for their CEO. Unless he's the bulletproof monk that should work out well.

Just like that speeding ticket. Rightsflop is, at least last time I checked, not part of the executive branch of the legal system. In other words, they have no right whatsoever to demand anything like this.

Unless someone bought a new law and I missed it...

What could possibly be important enough to put up with Metro?

Where and how is it better than Win7?