I briefly played with Unity as included with Ubuntu 11.04 and felt that it was interesting, but unfinished. I find Gnome 2 very usable now, though it had rough edges for years. Unity is less usable due to its rough edges.
Distributions intended to bring new users to Linux might do well to focus more on testing than new features. I've been using Linux on various laptops for almost 10 years now and I don't want to deal with instability and broken things on my production machine. New users looking for an alternative to Windows will likely find the grass is not greener on the other side. I'm not talking about ugly UI or inconsistency. I'm talking about the fact that my Thinkpad won't suspend, that my sound sometimes stops working, that my notification icons for Skype and a couple other apps were 1px for over a month while the bug was well-known.
Not all Ubuntu users are using a laptop. It is absurd to penalize desktop users with a UI that just isn't suited to desktop use.
OEMs often don't truly understand the needs and wants of their customers, as well. The recent backlash, even among laptop users, shows this quite well.
Ubuntu Unity is the number 1 feature OEMs weer asking form Ubuntu..