Well they were exaggerating but I think they had a point, til recently on my Desktop machines I only cared about having a web-browser, terminal (+ Steam at home).

Lately there are more UI-ish apps I value having everywhere including desktop (Spotify, Hipchat, Whatsapp, VSCode). I'd also love a decent cross-plat podcasts app.

I think it's clear there's now more demand for certain types of consumer-ish desktop apps (chat apps & music apps especially) than there was a few years ago.