[flukus]

I think it's more about the way effort is split. i3 would be an example of good competition, it does something the others don't. Unity on the other hand, does it do anything that couldn't have been done by changing the default gnome configuration? Competition is good but replication is a waste.

[brendaningram]

I like that quote: competition is good, but replication is a waste. One of the comments below says that Unity was a necessary experiment, and it could have resulted in something amazing. That's very true, and the world has some amazing inventions because somebody wasn't afraid to experiment.