Actually, all it did was give them latitude to do whatever they wanted. Roddenberry would not be pleased.
Agreed....and it wasn't necessary.
They could have easily treated these new run of films as a timeline during(or in between) the original series and
before 1979's S.T:The Motion Picture.
The circle of characters were already older at the time that film came out,and as the subsequent sequels were done.
The latitude for writing was not hindered by the original series(the films that followed yes maybe,but i doubt we'll see this reboot still going with these young actors doing Star Trek in their 40's and 50's LOL).
They could have just written a solid sci-fi story for the reboot without the whole Spock prime,time travel crap etc...blah blah blah....and then consequently written more stories that could have simply been dropped into the original series as a 1 hour show(for canon)...except it would be a full length motion picture with fresh young faces.
Unless Abrams or whomever plans on killing off one or two or three members of that core of characters,then there's free roam. The only character that died in the films was Spock. ...and Kirk...who was OLD.
Rebooting the timeline was not necessary.
Still a great film,just saying....it could have been epic.
I can't speak for Gene.