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I disagree that a faithful adaptation would do poorly in the box officee. A fairly faithful adaptation mind you: I don't expect to see the Goblins sing and dance to a show tune in the middle of a chase. The Hobbit's storyline is imo a better fit for the big screen than LotR, with plenty of scenes that would be great straight from the book. It's an adventure-story with plenty of action and thrills, but also lots of humour. Andsigil mentioned the cockney trolls who are hilarious but hopefully pretty scary too. There is also plenty of Dwarf comedy, and this time no-one can complain it isn't in the book in the first place. Can't wait for all the Bombur fat-jokes.

Sure there are drawback to a faithful adaptation. No love-affairs, few female characters, and few familiar LotR faces. Gollum and Gandalf is in of course, and they are enough I'd say, although I expect to see cameos from Legolas, Aragorn and Arwen too.

But there are drawbacks to a very loose adaptation too. The Hobbit is a famous book, and if critics perceive that the film-makers have taken too many liberties with it, the reviews might suffer as a result, and poor reviews could definitely hurt financially. But it's all a matter of perspective I suppose. I believe that LotR is regarded as a faithful adaptation of the book by the majority, an opinion not shared by most on this board.