Gnome UI is perfectly fine on a touch-driven device. Less so on a desktop, but since there are a number of viable alternatives (MATE, Xfce) that still integrate OK with Gnome components the UI itself doesn't matter all that much.
In my professional view touch UI and desktop UI must never be interchangeable or have similarities, the ergonomic interactions of using a mouse pointer are vastly different from the processes when using a finger.
UI matters for a vast majority of users and use-cases, I can live comfortably with tiling windows manager, but this is not the expected default.
That's why I stayed on Catalina for a long time, Apple has lost the focus from the past (and must reread some old HIG documentation for a change). Beauty is not a function of usability (example: the new Safari), the process of making interfaces more "exciting" and "fashionable" has his roots in marketing, not in product design.
I have tried in recent months all forms of DE's for Linux, the simplicity of Cinnamon and Mate was appealing but somewhat limiting.
KDE is modern and extendable, there are a ton of native apps and the experience of customizing the UI is more coherent and logical.
The only gripe that I have with KDE is the built-in telemetry, but luckily PureOS KDE is older implementation, so for now I am ok.:)
