This article was written in the sense of bashing gnome but yet some points seem to be valid. It explains the history of gtk 1 to 4 and the influence of gnome in gtk. I’m not saying gnome is bad here, instead I find this an interesting to read and I’m sharing it.
Yes. I also consider the removal of desktop icons, the default change to going into the activity view and whatnot important shifts and attempts at reinventing things.
Well, then I’d highly suggest you just use Xfce and not worry about GNOME so much. Xfce hasn’t changed much in years.