Re: re-purposing mu/buddypress to act more like classic wordpress
I have done exactly what you are talking about at http://buglenotes.com. I set default role to Author, turned off new blog creation, and then modified menus as nec to remove personal blog options (so as not to confuse). I also renamed the News menu item to Blog. Now everyone contributes posts to a “central” blog. So far so good. Of course, this could all backfire after launch 
