Rhys,
I'm happy to engage in any discussion, but let me remind you that it's never a good idea to make assumptions or statements about the other person with whom you are discussing a topic. It is much better to address the substantive issues, let me emphasize that, the substantive issues themselves and not the person. Having reminded you of that, let me return to the discussion of the issues...
Regarding "refactoring for the sake of prettiness":
All improvements and advancements in coding are motivated for many different reasons, and not merely "prettiness" which should never be belittled. It is "prettiness" more conventionally referred to as "elegance" that greatly promotes readability and maintainability of code. I believe that it is never possilbe to OVERemphasize the importance of readability and maintainability...
Regarding SQL Server 2005 and SQL Server 2008 versus other data stores:
Perhaps DotNetNuke will adopt a policy of adhering strictly to the ANSI SQL standards. If so, then my remarks about schemas versus owners are mostly irrelevant. However, as long as DotNetNuke serves primarily a Microsoft technologies world led by the current servers including SQL Server 2008 as promoted by Microsoft, then it is possible for DotNetNuke to support both the old scheme and a new scheme with a simple If Then or case switch in the data provider thereby keeping everybody happy.
Regarding your claim about "no benefits...world of pain" etc:
Based on that kind of argument, then Microsoft should never have introduced ASP.Net 3.5, LINQ, LING to SQL, etc etc, and developers should remain entrenched in classic ADO.Net with classic ASP.Net 1.1 or whatever refusing to learn LINQ or whatever else next comes down the road.
However, I will always choose to make as reasonable judgement as possible regarding the trade-offs of investing new time and effort to learn new technologies in order to gain what benefits I believe are there. In most cases, many of these advancements are in fact driven by programmers desire for "prettiness" otherwise known as "elegance" which again, is another way of saying, cost-efficient because if I can read it more easily, then so can somebody else, and that means it's more maintainable in less time by more people without making reading or writing mistakes of eyes or hands.
CT