>In fact I am willing to bet that the same people crapping all over Gnome now are the same people that crapped all over Gnome for NOT making significant changes in between versions and not keeping up with other desktops.
That fails even the most basic sanity test:
1. We are currently seeing enormous numbers of people complaining now
2. We didn't see enormous numbers of people complaining before[0]
=> They can't possibly be the same set of people.
[0] Or any people to speak of. Care to cite some examples of people complaining about Gnome *not* making changes? Can you manage, say, three examples?