Perhaps the saddest thing about this nerf is that it was most likely the result of complaints by people who were upset that now they would never get to do the grind they wanted to do "some day". But in all honesty, I doubt most of those people would ever have gone and done it anyway, for exactly the same reason that they hadn't done it (or at least made some real progress) already.
The people who had a legitimate gripe were those who had already committed to the FoS, both time and gold (and gold is basically time anyway) and would not be able to finish it. I personally think that removing the ability to gain Shen'dralar rep, but allowing those who were already Shen'dralar exalted to finish up in Cata (which is what it looked like was going to happen) would have been a good compromise. What we already saw was people who were miles away dropped the idea, sold their Librams and PBD's, made a huge profit, and provided the mats for those who were close to finishing it to do so.
Now the problem is that the solution has become too lenient and devalued the title "insane" for those who already have it.
However I think a lot of the outcryers need a bit of perspective on this: Removing Shen'dralar from the requirements does not trivialise the achievement. Yes, it makes it less difficult, but it is still a lot of work.
Ultimately, whether you have to grind mobs for rep/items, or pay gold for rep, it amounts to the same thing: You are sinking time and effort into the achievement. If you put a monetary value on time spent (basically how much gold you can grind per hour), then it becomes very easy to evaluate the overall effort of Insane in the Membrane. My experience is that it was a 320 hour game time achievement of which about 80% could be bought for gold (at 500g per hour). Of that the total time devoted per part of the achievement could be divided up as follows:
- Shen'dralar: 37.5%
- Darkmoon Faire: 37.5%
- Bloodsail Buccaneers: 2.5%
- Goblins: 10%
- Ravenholdt: 12.5%
And before people start saying Shen'dralar is more difficult than this because other reps can be easily obtained for money, 80% of the Shen'dralar effort could be managed as a simple gold grind (I spent about 100 hours of game time earning gold to pay for diamonds, shards and librams, 18 hours farming Blood of Heroes and Skins of Shadow and 2 hours actually running to DM and handing in using my Argent Gruntling).
So really, removing Shen'dralar has reduced the difficulty of the FoS by 37.5% or 3/8. Most people who can do the other 5/8 would probably have been able to complete Shen'dralar anyway. That being said, I think that people who did actually get Shen'dralar to exalted do need some more recognition than just another title. I have 2 solutions:
Create a title for having Shen'dralar exalted. For example: "of the Shen'dralar"
Create a second title for being both exalted with the Shen'dralar and Insane. For example: "the Clinically Insane" or "the Utterly Insane". The second title would become the "you had be there" title and would certainly appease all those who did things the hard way.
alternatively
Award a special mount for being exalted with Shen'dralar. Since they are Elves, maybe a cat for Horde and a Hawkstrider for alliance.