There are literally hundreds of desktop Linux distributions to choose from. Some, such as Gentoo and Linux From Scratch, are tough to use, but most of them are easy-peasy. With three decades of ...
Gentoo requires much more configuration than any mainline distribution outside of things like Linux From Scratch ... waiting for kernels and desktop environments to compile for days only to ...
but while it does signal a major departure for the distro if it means that more people are spurred to take their Linux usage further and experiment with Gentoo, this can never be a bad thing.