They have very detailed instructions in 20 languages. It's much more user-friendly than most software these days.

But their price point was set too high for their market.

Turns out that for a lot of victims wiping their old computer was deemed less expensive than the cost, nuisance, and risk of paying criminals through some shady internet fake money thing to possibly avoid having to wipe their computer.

For anyone with a recent backup of their data, I can't think of why they'd pay.

I think you are way underestimating the percentage of people who have good backups of their data.

HN'ers might, but HN would not be a representative sample.

A lot of the high-profile systems getting hit are embedded mission-critical systems. They'd be getting some amount of IT attention. And systems that aren't that important might not be important enough to ransom - just wipe and start over.

Agreed - I was thinking more of the individuals.

Almost makes you think the hysteria was the goal. The next illuminating question is "why," and the fallout the next couple of weeks will answer that.

Problem -> Reaction -> Solution.