What needs to change? Why isn't there Ubiquiti all over them mountain ranges?
If we could change the demographics of the hobby that would help. But to attract some younger tech minded folks is a chicken and egg type of thing. You have to have something first to entice them.
The second problem is regulatory. Data bandwidth issues, content issues.. all deturants.
How many people even know about the 44net space? Maybe we need to reach out to;
-The broadband-hamnet developers - presently they use 10.X.X.X address space
-VOIP developers, like IRLP, Echolink, and Allstar.
-Hams who run internet servers, like qsl.net, etc
It would probably help to have our own custom firmware or recommended hardware. I have to admit, I have been doing everything on a raspberry pi with a usb ethernet dongle for the second port. I haven't tried to install the custom rip daemon on something like a WRT54G or ??
Then there is the issue of how to integrate 44net into your home network.