Why is Maintenance so long?

[Fevelle]

We'll probably see a "Early completion time" post too, so don't lose hope.

[raymon]

We'll probably see a "Early completion time" post too, so don't lose hope.

yeah that happens a lot. the 24 hour thing is just in case of unforeseen difficulties.

[Ehr]

We'll probably see a "Early completion time" post too, so don't lose hope.

I wouldn't count on it. They don't end maintenance's before the weekly reset anymore due to people logging on and rushing the content to get it in before the reset. It could end like 30 minutes early but I wouldn't expect more than an hour since weekly reset is an hour before maintenance ends.

[Nekodar]

We'll probably see a "Early completion time" post too, so don't lose hope.

Don't get your hopes up for that... If I don't mis-remember, the scheduled end time for the maintenance corresponds to the weekly reset time.
It's not likely that they're bringing the servers online before the weekly reset.

[NolLacnala]

We'll probably see a "Early completion time" post too, so don't lose hope.

Probably not, since they're aiming to push it over weekly reset