The problem has never been Gnome Shell though, and the flak against would never have occurred if a few simple things had been done. A lot of people love Gnome Shell, but many more people simply hate it. But the Gnome developers insisted that they knew best, and that they alone had the "One True Way". And this lead to a lot of shoddy PR that everyone involved should have known was coming -- telling people that they're wrong for disliking something never wins you support.