We don't play WoW for the purest sense of enjoyement anymore, in Vanilla I was content running through zones because I adored the music and the scenery, how sad am I?
Now you play WoW to get stuff... thats it, and Blizzard keep you paying your subs by giving to you but dragging it out over a period of time...You might be a hardcore raider that feels different about this, but I am not really talking about you, I am talking about the largest part of the player base.., the average player.
One of the things I remember about Vanilla and to a lesser extent TBC was how BG was still something most people still did, finish a raid... someone would say "anyone for some pvp?" ... I loved that... gear didn't put you off so much. I am happy that the more PvP minded players have their own area endgame in WoW and they are rewarded for it, but I always missed the random PvP games that seemed to be filled with just about anybody and you'd find yourselves working together to co-ordinate a flag drop or supporting a base.