There IS no framework deployment hell. We work ONLY in .NET, and there has never been even a single complaint.

However, it would be nice to see a native compiler option for .NET. They exist commercially, I believe, but not as part of VS, currently. That would solve your problem with obfuscation, and wrapping the frameworks into the OS, as is happening, would remove the other difference between VB6 and .NET. It seems to be a simple option. Byte code programs are intended to run anywhere, but that's not how most people work. Offering the option to compile to native seems like a simple enough change. However, it would be an onerous change unless that really had something to do with why people still use VB6, and I frankly doubt that is a reason for the vast majority.