I haven't read this whole thread, so maybe this has been said but: Since the problem with the talent was its spammability in PVP, why didn't they just reduce the amount of damage that it protected? That way, the PVE tanks would still have their aoe threat talent, while the PVP players would no longer be able to use this "exploit." (if you can call it that)

The devs said that all information will be restored once the servers go back up. That is partially why it is taking so long. They have to make sure they don't delete anything.