I'm guessing all these people refusing to upgrade are older, conservative middle aged people that are just stuck in their ways. If not, its really silly to see young people so scared of change, especially for tech enthusiasts who love new things.
We're not scared. We just don't like the way they've implemented it, and they aren't paying us money to use it, but asking for money from our pockets for the ability to use it.
I am not a business, that has bought into Microsoft's development stack, or some vertical market Windows-only software, or MS Office. I need to be convinced that it is worth my money to use their new product. I can go try a new DE/WM for free, and honestly find Compiz (usually w/ XFCE, but LXDE has been warming on me) and E17 both superior to 7, and KDE can be made about as good. Neither cost me anything that I don't already have. The catch is that OSes using them can't run a newish version of Visio (Dia is making huge strides, though!), nor can play most video games.
It was done poorly. When they do it better, I'll pay for that version. I've had to learn to use it to support it. It's just plain awkward, the start screen sucks, and the flat look they force is difficult to quickly scan in person (texture and contrast are
good things), and is especially bad once it has been compressed (remote support, FI). Lenovo's and Toshiba's, with start menu replacements, are OK, especially 8.1, where it really has been possible to stay out of Metro, even without being able to use the win key (again, a difficulty for remote support that isn't an issue for 7 or older). But then, that makes it where there's a fragmentation of Windows 8/8.1 GUIs, as well.
8.1 is nicer than 8. But, what does it offer that's worth paying $100 for? 7 offered enough over XP or Vista. 8 nor 8.1 do, for many of us not using touch all the time (I've used Win 8 w/ touch once, on a demo tablet). Like Vista, it has some good features, but was mismanaged, and they're going to need a couple years to reconcile it all. After they do that, I'll have no problem buying whatever the nicely fixed up OS ends up being, be it 9, 10, 11, or 50, so long as I still have a need for Windows.
For example, if they implemented per-session Explorer options, like Dolphin, PCManFM, Thunar, et al, have, that would be a huge plus--context-sensitive can go DIAF (it is one of the things I dislike about any Windows since XP, not something 8 has worse; 8's Explorer is an improvement over 7's). The in-fashion flat looks needs to either go away, or be an easy to change default, because it's just plain bad; I've used constrast, shapes, and colors to tell what I'm looking at quickly since...well, before I knew what a computer was. A menu to organize programs needs to come back, without 3rd-party utilities (the point is to make it easy to locate rarely-used programs, or programs rarely started directly, and nested menus are
perfect for doing that). They
must either integrate Metro/Modern and desktop into a single cohesive window manager, or allow them to be switched by explicit choice, rather than by focus. They could do other things, too, but those come right to mind.
Either it becomes worthwhile to upgrade, or a pretty much unpatchable security hole needs to be found in an older one (such as the general security model before Vista).
For those using windows XP, wtf?
Now, that I agree with.
Windows 8, requires more mouse movement (lifting, dragging, scrolling) due to the menu click areas being more spread versus 7's Start menu access. This is even more true, if the user does not bother to tune their acceleration and mouse speed settings.
For which the correct setting is, "off," be it mouse or trackball or trackpad. Acceleration is only suitable for sticks, like trackpoints.
<- fussy gamer
For those that do want to keep their traditional lifting and dragging mice
The trick is to slam it against the opposite edge of the screen, if using desktop programs. Fast, and no picking up and then setting down, and then getting bearings again. But, it requires enough DPI or acceleration to do it inside the mouse pad, and lots of folk are still either using 300-400 DPI mice, or so used to having them that they find their new mice too sensitive.
Outside of FPS/TPS gaming, trackballs are definitely better, but acceleration is awful on them, much as it is on a mouse. Acceleration on trackpads has to be the worst, though, and on many it can't be turned off.