Okay where are you getting your information from? Cause it is all wrong.
Wincustomize, StyleXP, even Neowin with it UXTheme.dll patch can modify your widows to look like anyone of over thousands of different looks. So that is wrong.
DRM is at the hardware level. Blame nvidia and ATI for placing that restriction on their cards. Not Microsoft for putting it in the OS.
Genuine Windows was on XP LONG before Vista was even in Beta. So i have no idea why you think that was new with Vista.
The Windows updating itself again is a XP issue not a Vista issue.
So none of the stuff you even said refers to Vista let alone why they shouldnt improve with Windows 7.