Ubuntu/Canonical might have better luck by releasing a more rolling release distro to test these changes. The Daily build is fine and all, but it reflects the status of the trunk. Having a few branches that can go on wild adventures, killing off 'quit' buttons and rearranging the UI, might benefit them more than the cost of implementing it.

I'm specifically referencing the way Fedora tends to be the frontline for RedHat and CentOS updates, and isn't afraid to roll back when things go bad.