Ok, ok, ok, ok. I'll bite.

There are obviously several things Oblivion has done better than Skyrim. We can all see that. But can we just simply conclude that Oblivion is downright better than Skyrim? You can have that opinion, in the same way people (like me) can disagree with that.
Of the things you listed, I'll agree with UI. Yes, only UI.

-Quests
Quests what? Style of quests? Duration? Scope?
I personally believe that Oblivion did the Faction quests a lot better, both in quantity and in quality. I can't speak for the Main Q as I haven't even started it yet, but aside from that I don't see any glaring difference with Oblivion. Quests are still largely fetch&kill, it's just more obvious due to the lack of a journal. Why that? The journal adds a story element to the most mundane quests in Oblivion. Skyrim gives us a grocery list, effectively framing these quests as 'Do X, Kill Y, go to Z'.

-Magic
Personally, I like the current magic system. It works, it looks incredibly good and it added dual casting. It allows us to hold a spell in one hand, and a weapon in the other, effectively fulfilling the dream of many Battlemagi. Magic is not affected by simple armor rating, which finally makes sense in Skyrim.
It lacks spellmaking. Yes. I for one never used spellmaking, was never compelled to use it and never felt that I was gimping myself by not using it. Ok, Mysticism has been removed, but it has been redistributed. Some spells were removed, those can and are easily added through mods.

Ok, if you value spellmaking this much, I can understand your point. But I disagree.

-NPCs
NPCs what? They are voiced better than before. They look better than before, they are more diverse and (to me) more believable. They interact with the world in a better way too. Are they robotic? I don't have this feeling. This is Skyrim, I find their solitary, distant disposition fitting.

-Skills
Skills are still present as perks. Ok, not all of them, but they removed the chore of Major and Minor skills, of selecting certain skills as your major skills so you could control your leveling and avoid leveling up far too quickly.
The current system is far more logical: Using every skill progresses you towards your level up. They also added the, in my opinion, incredibly fun perk system. It adds a dimension to planning your character, it adds to the experience by visualizing your progression, and by making clear what you can expect when you level up.

-Hotkeys
I’ll let this one slide. Hotkeys works just as well.

-Armor
Pure personal taste here. Armors look great in Skyrim, there’s enough diversity. It’s not better or worse than anything Oblivion featured.

-Creatures
How? Because we’re no longer seeing Imp after Imp after Imp? There have been numerous great additions to the creature base in this game. Perhaps you dislike them, fine.

Are you kidding me?????!!!!!! Oblivion has to be the worst game of any genre I've ever played (I tried some pretty bad games too). It's horrible in every way INCLUDING the user interface which I find much better in Skyrim, I don't want to use the mouse for everything. It also took bad meele combat to a next level. And there was the fact that archery was ridiculously underpowered and felt fake. I do archery and I can tell you Skyrim did a pretty great job with making it "feel" realistic...as far as virtual games go.

EDIT; perhaps it did the quests better but as I focus more on the world itself, this is a mute point for me.

I think some people are mentally comparing modded Oblivion to vanilla Skyrim. I

If Oblivion was horrible than it shouldn't have made GOTY, won awards for soundtrack and graphics, and sold so many copies- apparently lots of people liked awful games.

Even if they had Paolo Cuelho writing the stories and characters for Oblivion it would never get me past the clumsy mechanics to actually enjoy them because I spent too much time being annoyed with the crappy implementation of leveling, attributes and skills.

I disagree. Cyrodiil was bland, lacked character. The different holds in Skyrim look sufficiently distinct and the world is a lot more believable, memorable.

Skyrim is bland and lacks character. Oooo, bearded dudes who like axes drink often, how original. Worst part is Nord lore can get very interesting once you delve into it, but did Beth bother covering that? No, they decided to just scratch the surface.

Skyrim > Daggerfall = Morrowind > Skyrim > Oblivion > Skyrim

GOTY for Bethesda releases is kind of a local custom now don't ya think?

Mahoney- your list is interesting, but the one thing you didn't mention was choice. Oblivion gave the player more choices about what kind of character to be. I respect that you like Skyrim so much, but many people who also like Skyrim have justifiably complained about the loss of magic choices and magic making. You may find Skyrim's magic pleasing- but it has less choice. Any new game will always be better in gameplay mechanics and graphics. I like the spells in Skyrim better than Oblivion- for how they look and react on screen.

papercut ninja- I understand why you don't like Oblivion's mechanics, but that was state of the art, or nearly so, at the time of introduction. For some, it's a deal breaker. For others, it's less important than content.

OOOO pudding faced tan guys who like to say nonsensical things. And actually, beards were one of the finest additions to the game.

You guys are making me wanna go play Oblivion again!

If 'bearded dudes who like axes and drink often' is your characterization of the Skyrim world, I pity you. You haven't had one look at the style and personality of the areas because you're too jaded to see you're wrong.

LOL most of the negatives you mentioned can be fixed with mods...

NPC:s were one of the few things that were better in Oblivion, and only marginally. Mods kept me interested. So far I've invested more hours in Skyrim unmodded than in Oblivion unmodded. I also have more "moments of wonder" in Skyrim than in Oblivion and I treasure those moments highly.

yougivingmelipboy? GOTY a local custom for Oblvion? Maybe, yougivemelipboy? but it sold a lot of copies.
That wasn't faked or a custom.

I was merely referring to the fact that I haven't seen anyone claim Arena had more depth etc. than Daggerfall

Also I would like to say that although less cheerful, the NPCs in this seem slightly more realistic than Oblivions - they're still robots but they're better robots.

Since Skyrim doesn't require a disc in the drive I have Oblivion loaded and play the one I am in the mood for that session.....While I agree wholeheartedly with the original post I will admit that Oblivion is HEAVILY moded so in all fairness will hope for someone to make some improvements to Skyrim.....quests in Skyrim are really bad and I am sure Bethesda has seen this topic mentioned enough that maybe developers for whatever comes next are listening....of course I am not going to worry about that because this will be my last unless they GET RID OF STEAM

That is the impression I got about Nords from both Morrowind and Oblivion so where did Skyrim fail? Not to mention there is a lot more that goes into nordic culture, then just beards and ax swinging. Takes a keen eye to notice though. Like the jarl of whiterun giving his ax to ulfric. There is a lot more meaning and tradition that goes into that gesture then some dudes with beards swinging axes around.

Okay fine, there is the occasional "I like money." or "HONOR RAWR!".

"You can't know a Nord women until you've gotten her drunk."

I apologize that my ability to perceive virtual worlds is inferior to yours.

To the above: Yes, there are fleeting references to the deeper aspects of Nord culture and lore, but normally only in two lines of dialogue and the occasional shrine.

Yes, Nords like to fight. Yes, they love booze, yes they enjoy telling tall tales. But the game hardly goes into depth with that. It just scraqes up some shavings with it's fingernail.

Heh my name sounds funny in a sentence *cue Peter Griffin laughter*
It's actually yougivINGmelipboy? but thanks for using my full name anyhow. And I think it sold so many copies since everyone liked Morrowind so much.

Overall, Skyrim is better than Oblivion. For me it is due to the way the world feels at least somewhat organic.
Time doesn't freeze when you enter conversation, people have jobs and behave a bit more naturally,
radiant quests, lots of random events, important people (shopkeepers) are replaced if killed, etc.

A few more of the specifics, with some spoilers throughout:

Here's a fine NPC dialogue from Oblivion; http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2KU5fXUx4N4

Disagree completely. The same goes for Morrowind for me.