There will be a 5e

Got this link from Westeros, Enworlds collection of 5e info and announcements:

http://www.enworld.org/index.php?page=dnd5e

For those who haven't seen it, this site is a useful (if completely unofficial) step in that direction:

http://lomion.de/cmm

Yeah, it is hard to say what crippled 4e the most. I think it was only a matter of time before some company used the OGL to create 3.75. If 3e and 4e were similar enough Paizo would have been SOL.

I think the massive alterations to the Realms, AFAIK a reliable flagship in terms of RPG, CRPG, and novels didn't help.

Was the GSL too restrictive? Possibly so, as suddenly people were faced with a limited product choice.

The PDFs were a huge deal breaker for me at least - I used by a couple every week.

I'm very curious what their plan is. Likely separate parts of the game into different systems, perhaps even to the point of plug-and-play for different aspects of combat.

Yeah, you have a point, Sciborg. I think that's another thing that hurt WotC was that once they fired Heinsoo, they were never clear what direction they were planning on taking 4E, and I doubt even they knew. Adding to fan discouragement was watching as WotC fired nearly all their veteran staff (many of whom flocked to Paizo). This caused fans to lose confidence in the company.
The fluff, I don't think, was a significant deal breaker, unfortunately. IIRC the Realms no longer had the following that Eberron was gaining (as far as new blood, anyway).
So I think the main things that hurt WoTC here are:

--The Essentials line and lack of a plan for where they were heading with 4E, the rampant firing of staff, mixed messages, and the overall jumbled mess of a company that WoTC became in '09~10 (probably the primary problem here)
--The Essentials line confused prospective players (again, ties in with the above)
--Completely pulling the PDFs, including those of previous editions (3rd party D20 sales have since skyrocketed) and basically damn near requiring DDI for anything digital

Basically, WoTC jumped the gun in '09 when they couldn't handle the fact that they were no longer monopolizing the sales thanks to Paizo and Pathfinder. However, if WotC hadn't jumped the gun like they did with the Essentials crap, appealing to 3.5 fans, firing Heinsoo, etc., it's possible that Pathfinder wouldn't have taken off like it did. I mean, look at the transition from 2E to 3.0-- it took a lot of people a couple years before they were willing to give 3x a try. If WotC had stayed the course with the Heinsoo version of 4e (which was the best one and worked, BTW), then they'd likely be on top right now. Instead, they caved in to 3x fan demands merely a year after 4E came out, and some of the demands they caved to (the complaints about martial characters using the powers system just like everyone else being the main one that comes to mind) were just plain stupid.

I went straight from 2nd edition to 3.5. I liked the rules being more streamlined and logical than 2nd edition, and it didnt seam to lose any significant flavour. As 3.5 developed, I became increasingly disheartened by the lack of fluff in the books and I pretty much went off in search of other systems.

I never got into WOW, in fact I really hated that game, so when I heard from gamer friends how much of WOW got implemented into 4e, I decided to steer clear. To this day, the closest I've been to 4e is skimming the contents table of the players handbook. I've heard stories of games and all in all, I live in blissful ignorance.

I probably wont be picking up 5e unless it gets great reviews for ease of use. If I want to run a short adventure, 3.5 works fine and its universally known by the people I play with. Otherwise I'm off the WOTC train, its all gotten too complicated for me, its homebrew and small setting specific systems from here on out.

Usually when they create a new edition, it always has a bunch of bugs that need worked out. 2.0 and 3.0 are good examples of this, and 3.0 had tons of loopholes to exploit (IIRC there was a psionic power that allowed you to inflict like 250 damage if you optimized your character) 2.0 had problems as well, but they weren't nearly as bad.
4E was pretty fine-tuned and didn't really have too many problems. The jump to essentials was WotC panicking that people weren't immediately ditching 3.5 for 4E, and that a lot of people were switching to Pathfinder-- despite the fact that fans dragged their feet when 3.0 came out as well-- for a good two years. Like I said, were it not for jumping the gun with essentials, 4E would likely be way ahead of Pathfinder by now, especially if PDF sales hadn't been pulled, which was an incredibly stupid move IMO.
Another problem apparently is that WotC basically lost interest in DDI about a year ago, so people aren't renewing their subscription for it.

Hyena of Ice, I wasn't refering to such changes as simply correcting errata or a "broken" spell or power. Of course there's gonna be misprints and such to fix. What I meant was such apparently abitrary game-rule changes as deciding to kill the "animal" type and put them all under "beast" in 3.5 (which mattered, because 3E rules distinguished between the two types when it came to what creatures you could use an ability on. If you had the 3E books and then bought a 3.5 Monster Manual such as MMIII, you were left wondering which "beasts" to count as "animals" for the purpose of adjudicating spells and such.) There were a lot of changes that just seemed like change for the sake of change, rather than being needed or neccessary. What was wrong with 4E that necessitated the replacement of the core rulebooks with the Essentials line? Why can't they just do things ONE way for the duration of a given edition - would it really kill 'em?

What I meant was such apparently abitrary game-rule changes as deciding to kill the "animal" type and put them all under "beast" in 3.5 (which mattered, because 3E rules distinguished between the two types when it came to what creatures you could use an ability on.
No, it's the beast type that was changed to Animal and Magical Beast. Personally, I prefer the elimination of the Beast type.

Is there any truth to the rumor that 5E will revert back to the Great Wheel Cosmology? (as, no doubt, many here hope...)

To be perfectly honest, I think removing just 4 was not enough. They should have just cut off the entire thing.

I dunno, sometimes I think loving the Great Wheel, and at the same time despising the Alignment is part of being a Planescape fan.

I must admit, those news made me slightly less interested in 5ed (or D&D Next as some call it)...

As 3.5 developed, I became increasingly disheartened by the lack of fluff in the books and I pretty much went off in search of other systems.
The splatbooks are full of fluff-- Tome of Magic, the two Fiendish Codices, 3.5 Drow of the Underdark, Lords of Madness, and Elder Evils, especially-- those books are absolutely overflowing with interesting fluff. You missed out, man.

A pity Monte Cook quit. I think he was completely wrong for the 5e mechanics, as Rob Heinsoo IMO fixed most of the problems present in previous editions *3x especially* where warrior-types, Fighters in particular, are useless compared to full magic users at higher levels (or all levels if you optimize), and it sounded like Monte Cook wanted to regress to a lot of the 3x mechanics, including the class-based ones. However, he is without a doubt one of the best employees to ever grace the D&D staff when it comes to the fluff.