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Going back to the actual object of the thread (hint hint...)
(1) I personally think that the proposed 'correction' to the thresholds above which delay compensation kicks in is disproportionately favourable to the airlines and I certainly hope that the Parliament will correct it. I think that the airlines have done some very effective lobbying here in order to reach a situation whereby the compensation regime is not more but even less generous than what most would consent spontaneously. If adopted, it is likely to make the compensation part of a revised directive entirely irrelevant/theoretical as the vast majority of currently eligible cases will now be excluded (enjoy your delay of 11h50 minutes with no compensation). I seriously hope that the Parliament will reject the Commission's proposal (either completely or amending it).
(2) The 'obligation to inform' is one of those absurd bureaucratic red herrings. It is the same as the obligation to give people reasons when their requests are rejected: invariably, this results in totally empty statements that are so general as not to be subject to possible legal challenge and I have no doubt that this is exactly what will happen here.
(3) The Commission seems to achieve the incredible miracle of 'clarifying' every aspect of the 'exceptional circumstances' that have already been perfectly clarified by the ECJ (mechanical is not eligible, air traffic strike is, etc) and none of those which remain potentially unclear (what about a strike by the airline's own personnel or cancellation of flight from a to b because there is snow in c or because the airline decides to affect the aircraft to d)
All in all, in my view, this is an overall poor proposal from the point of view of passengers and one which I hope will fail. Under the pretense of clarifying and reinforcing rights, it allows airlines to be spared a significant part of the obligations that they were under. While some new obligations are being imposed, they are, in my opinion far less significant overall and there will be many more losers than winners amongst passengers.