Hey Bryan,
Your gripes haven't fallen on deaf ears :)
The chatty protocol feedback we've heard a few times, and we're doing our best to optimize it.
The Lion issues we'll investigate ASAP.
As for #3, That's actually a highly requested feature (see http://ae.ro/iUi6OZ), so it's pretty high on our to do list
#4. We've thought about this for a while, not really sure yet how we will implement it though.
#5. Working on that, as well, no ETA yet though :)
Regarding #3 (and probably #4), make sure they don't clutter your default UI (maybe hide them behind a small button in preferences). There's a reason why Dropbox is so popular, and it's because it's just a folder that syncs. You might want to preserve that simplicity as much as you can in AeroFS too.
As for #3, That's actually a highly requested feature (see http://ae.ro/iUi6OZ), so it's pretty high on our to do list
#4. We've thought about this for a while, not really sure yet how we will implement it though.
#5. Working on that, as well, no ETA yet though :)