If you have an application (lets say offlineimap, which is one I use), then you have two options:
1.) Install via a package manager (if they have it) 2.) Install via pip (or whatever)
But #2 is a step backwards. Imagine having to learn the ecosystem and tools for every programming language just to get common apps running. And then being responsible for updating all the virtual environments, etc.
Package managers are a very useful abstraction for end users who don't always care and just want shit to work. But fragmentation is increasing, and each language is going the blackjack and hookers route (Futurama reference).
I don't see an easy solution, unfortunately.
Another option is to just include the required libraries in your package and have the executable add the paths via sys.addsitedir. Pipenv installed via Homebrew does this.
As a developer, I have to take special care to distribute the application in a way that works for all kinds of setups.
I trust distros to do the integration work a lot better. For tools like youtube-dl or quodlibet, distro packages work quite well.
Then run it all in a Venv.
Also, you have to do that for python apps, for node apps, for go apps, for rust apps, etc.
As an user, I just want to run "apt install application" and have it work with dependencies kept up to date by the OS package manager and not have to micromanage the dependencies for all applications I use.
I believe you are referring to this post https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29238700
I also wondered the same thing, but the issue seems to be mostly for people who want to distribute tools built in Python via Linux package managers
i.e. it should be possible to do that and not have to explain to users that it even uses Python, and certainly not that you have to first set up a virtualenv, then pip install dependencies etc
It's a use case I've never had, and mostly just accepted that Python was ill-suited for, but I can see it would be nice if it worked and at the same time didn't compromise other uses too much