IMHO the "average user" has indeed mostly abandoned PCs in favor of tablets and smartphones, as far as home use is concerned.
I'm not sure a convergence a la GNOME Shell makes sense -- the most successful execution in this category is probably OS X/iOS, and notice that they ship the OS X-based iOS *first*, and only gradually tailor OS X later to make the user experience more consistent.
So yes, making the default end-user-friendly is a good idea, but I think "confusing" features should only be hidden by default, not yanked out altogether, and only if advanced configuration tools like gnome-tweak-tool and dconf-editor become first-class supported apps. Otherwise we're chasing a user segment that doesn't exist in sufficient numbers yet.
And someone better do something about GNOME Shell's graphics stack. I've given up using it on a top-of-the-line 2013 Dell ultrabook because it just gobbles up RAM and CPU cycles like crazy. (Yes, it's using an Intel graphics chipset)
Re: Thoughts
I'm not sure a convergence a la GNOME Shell makes sense -- the most successful execution in this category is probably OS X/iOS, and notice that they ship the OS X-based iOS *first*, and only gradually tailor OS X later to make the user experience more consistent.
So yes, making the default end-user-friendly is a good idea, but I think "confusing" features should only be hidden by default, not yanked out altogether, and only if advanced configuration tools like gnome-tweak-tool and dconf-editor become first-class supported apps. Otherwise we're chasing a user segment that doesn't exist in sufficient numbers yet.
And someone better do something about GNOME Shell's graphics stack. I've given up using it on a top-of-the-line 2013 Dell ultrabook because it just gobbles up RAM and CPU cycles like crazy. (Yes, it's using an Intel graphics chipset)