Even before Wayland I get the sense that the screen reader desktop Linux experience was "this is just about usable if you're an expert". You just can't blame people for not wanting to put up with that, or giving up before they get far into it.
Yup, and now it’s regressing so totally understandable that for those who somehow made it work, this is the straw that breaks the camel’s back. Personally, when I developed RSI and other health issues (that made me seriously consider giving up programming or anything computer related as a career), I found that I didn’t want to put up with the state of a11y in Linux and switched to macOS. That was worlds better even though I missed a ton of features from Linux. After a lot of time and money, I’ve made my way back to being able to continue my career, and thankfully don’t need those tools anymore. I still give Linux a try for a few months every year to see if it’s time to switch back. For certain users, I can understand why Linux feels like it’s not there and even regressing.
