If you've been playing Guild Wars for years, why wouldn't you shell out $10 to change your character's appearance? Unlike other MMOs you haven't been shelling out $15/month for 4 years just to play the game, and these prices are still in line with those charged by subscription games to do the same thing.

As to the lack of free updates . . . what exactly do you expect? Guild Wars' business model was based on the idea of paying for expansion packs to increase content rather than subscriptions. It's unfortunate that they haven't added any major content since the Eyes of the North campaign, but they've added vastly more content to their game over the last 4 years than has, say, World of Warcraft, and you've paid a hell of a lot less for it too.