I would imagine that some (many?) of the Linux die-hards are getting butt-hurt over Ubuntu going all Windows-like trying to be mainstream. IMO, if Linux, and specifically, any particular distribution, wants to go mainstream, they are going to have to make these types of sacrifices/usability "improvements" in order to pull users from other OSs, especially if said users are entrenched in their current OS. Like you said, the packages are easy to get for more power-type users. That, and there are other distros out there.