For a start many of those things if you look in the code aren't a "constant". I can tell you haven't looked at the code because you would see there is 3 bands of increase, 2%, 6% and 10%. So already you're coming from a ridiculously ignorant position.
Alright, you got me. I assumed that since changing the difficulty increase cap doesn't require anything more than changing a single constant, you would have been smart enough to do it that way. Instead, you decided to add pointless complexity. Good job?
Secondly the majority of the Bitcoin procotol works well, so the majority of the the protocol needs little changing in my mind, but when it comes to the important things I did change them, as small as they may be. They make SolidCoin a resilient network, BETTER than Bitcoin. This isn't subjective.
Are you really making your stand on 3 minute blocks vs. 10 minute blocks? That's the reason we're all supposed to switch blockchains, because
you think 10 minutes is too long and 3 minutes won't cause scalability problems?
Thirdly if you think all that Bitcoin is about is the protocol you probably share the same characteristics as many of the developers, most with their heads in the sand. Where is the ease of use to get grandma using it? Where are the tools to help developers make secure sites so that MyBitcoin.com's aren't happening every second week. Where is the education of the people who are now losing money for others through careless mistakes? Where are the optimizations to the most commonly called APIs? We have sites going up and down like a yoyo as they try to balance a broken program.
The reason I stress the protocol is that everything else can be fixed without switching blockchains. Hell, even if there's a problem with the protocol, it can still be fixed if you achieve consensus on the change. So why start over? If you absolutely can't work with the mainline client devs, you can always fork the client and stay on the same blockchain. Your ego trip would last longer too.