Has KDE 4 caught up with KDE 3 yet?

Perhaps it was somewhat hyperbolic :) still, it's a pretty accurate reflection of what everyone I have discussed this with has said; generally it starts with 'they did *what*? Why would anyone ever consider that a good idea?' and segues into a desire to not have anything to do with KDE ever again: I am generally able to deflect this by mentioning the existence of --no-fork and konsole replacements... Why is --no-fork not the default, anyway?