My small system is usually two computers. Having a router/proxy/firewall box at home is not all that uncommon, and some examples I gave apply there nicely.

Do you really think that your requirements apply? I think none do in case of really a small system. See, I think I understand your requirements, but I think they are not common at all.

For a small system - a desktop PC and maybe a custom router box - you do not need one central place for the logs. Thus you don't need an easy way to change it. You don't need to preserve logs in a more efficient way than logrotate does. They don't need to be stored more structured than the filesystem does, the queries are local, and grep is more than efficient enough.

Maybe a binary log is the best choice for you - it seems to be what you want. But that does not generalize to the general public. That is why the rant feels very misplaced for me.