I think its good they are making it possible to have the start screen default to the "all apps" screen rather than the default tiles. However this still isn't as good as what the start menu already did. I don't really care either way anymore. Start 8 can now recreate the start menu, boot to desktop, and disable all those hot corners. My pc is essentially running windows 7 again with the upgrades windows 8 does provide. (and there are actually quite a few)
yes I believe accord to the majorities of rumors it will be an opt-in function. However someone might be pulling our collective leg on whether it really has returned or not
the article posted glosses the return with a link about a leak.
this is the latest official answer.
We’ve improved the way you navigate to Start with the mouse by changing the Start “tip” to be the familiar Windows logo. The new tip appears anytime you move the mouse to the bottom left corner of the screen, and is always visible on the taskbar when on the desktop. There are also options to change what the corners do, and options to boot into alternate screens. For example, if you prefer to see the Apps view versus all the tiles, you can choose to have the Start screen go directly to Apps view.