Unity strikes me as a cargo cult desktop environment. It tries to create a solid user experience by merely copying the appearance of a highly-regarded user experience. Because it goes about things in this way, it's doomed to fall flat: Unity's fundamental failure is focusing on superficial characteristics when what really creates a solid user experience is the underlying mechanics. It doesn't matter how it looks if it's confusing, frustrating, or clunky. Microsoft illustrated that with Windows Vista. And now Ubuntu is illustrating that with Unity.