40-man raids weren't hated. They weren't bad. They weren't unfunny. Just roam around the three QQ threads open at any time of day and night around the General Forum filled with people moaning for Classic Servers and you'll know that those people liked 40-mans a lot. Everyone liked them, you're not rare by any means by liking them.

The problem was that they were unpractical. While of course, those few who could find 39 other people who had a similar schedule to theirs and who knew how to play the game well had a blast during Vanilla WoW, probably experiencing the best era of WoW raiding ever, they forgot (to say it mildly, to say it harsh - didn't care) about the biggest part of the community, who were paying just as they were yet got to see half the content.

The problem was that the other 97% of the population, those who had busy schedules and couldn't synchronise their play time with the times of 39 other people, were just paying Blizzard the same amount of money as those people who were having loads of fun, yet all they did was to enjoy a mediocre game, being practically locked away from the very essence of this game.

While 40-man raids sound epic and alluring, they really won't happen anymore. They were a good idea, but not a profitable one.

What's exacly the difference between 25-man and 40-man people? 15 more names on the screen. I think that Blizzard would rather live with you missing those extra 15 blue names floating above PCs heads than having to double (again) the amount of work they need for each content patch and design dungeons for 40 people too.