That's a potentially complex question, but from my point of view it really isn't. I know what I want with WordPress, I know what I want from it. And currently it doesn't deliver.
Give me the editor I want
Really what made me dislike WordPress is how they shoved Gutenberg down my throat. Or tried to anyway. I stumbled along with the Classic Editor and Classic Widget plugins for a while. But ultimately gave up on using WordPress for my websites. One by one I moved my sites away from WordPress and explored other options. The only sites that I still run that use WordPress are my development sites for plugins that I make, such as AdRotate Banner Manager and AdRotate Pro. Everything else either uses a fork from WordPress or something else entirely.
But really all I want is a decent editor as default.
Stop the handholding and cloud integrations
Being a WooCommerce user I also got fed up with how they want you to run everything from the cloud these days. Endless overpriced themes, plugins, services, integrations. I want none of it, none! My site always ran fine without it. My site still runs fine without it. So stop trying to sell it to me like it's something I need.
I do NOT want to pay upwards of $1500US per year on subscriptions just to run a basic webshop that has been running fine since 2011 without all that modernist nonsense. Just let me buy those plugins once, like it should be. Because at the core of it I don't mind paying for good software at all. Especially not if I earn money with that software or use it regularly. And if you want repeatable income, just make me re-buy them with major updates. Or even a yearly license at a acceptable price will do - Similar to how I sell my AdRotate Pro plugin.
But stop trying to drain my wallet for little to no benefit to me! The only result is that now I buy none of your software and services - Well done Automattic!
But that's their loss, not mine!
Fixing WordPress
It's a bit more complex and nuanced than this, obviously. But really all it would take to lure me back into the WordPress world is to let me choose my own editor and stop the reliance on things like Jetpack, cloud integrations and remote stuff - Mostly the editor though.
On install, and really at any later point, WordPress can easily offer a setup without any editor. It can default to Gutenberg, I don't care. But let me choose a different editor and let me uninstall Gutenberg and the insane reliance on it. There are a bunch of editors that can and will benefit from a decoupling.
For example; I would then have the choice to not use any editor at all, like I have been doing since 2010. Just let me write my own layouts in HTML. Or I could choose what I currently use in Classicpress, a Markdown editor. Or hell, even Elementor or TinyMCE are better options than Gutenberg. I'm sure there are other editors as well. And they all could be adapted to be a 'standard' editor.
Really all it takes is WordPress offering an API for the basic functions and enforce a format into which posts and content needs to be stored so themes can use it. It needs to provide a few functions and universal controls for editors to use. For things like images and such. From the other side, plugins can hook into that and extent the experience any way they please. And the result? The world would be a better place.
If people still want to use Gutenberg, well, that's their problem. But also their choice - It just won't be my pick.
Just let me f*cking choose!