Ubuntu has been losing that plot for a long time. Remember when they shipped a version with essentially broken audio? Because they decided to switch to PulseAudio?
Which was subsequently fixed. That's how things get done with open-source. You make a big change, lots of stuff break at first, then they get fixed over time. Audio has been working flawlessly for a couple years here.
Yes, but when you're trying to make an "end-user" product, you don't throw in huge changes a few weeks before release. Which is what they did with Pulse.