How, exactly, is someone supposed to appreciate new sets they don't like when the one(s) they really love can't be purchased (new) anymore?
I have a friend who is new to all this and he has this vision in his mind for his perfect keyboard. It requires the Honeywell keysets from 7bit to make it happen. No other set has the colors he needs, in all the necessary keyboard positions, and in SA format. For him, none of the proposed sets in any of the ICs out there will do him any good. Telling him to appreciate the diversity of sets and colorways that can play absolutely no role in making his custom keyboard vision come to life is not only useless, it is patronizing.
I think it helps to put oneself into the shoes of a newcomer, who has never been privvy to the history of this community and has missed out on all the previous group buys. These notions of exclusivity and exclusive control are helpful to only those who already have what they want, are bored, and can only get it up for the invigorating promise of sets yet to be.
As long as this notion of constantly moving forward, and thumbing ones noses at future customers who long for a set from the past prevails, there will always be incentive to recreate those sets of the past, or at the very least their colorways. If the demand is strong enough, then the PuLSE colorway will find its way back into production, without the PuLSE icon keys, and at that point MiTo's desire to keep it from ever resurfacing will be sheer futility.
The more you tighten your grip, MiTo, the more colorways will slip through your fingers...