Gnome3 is a major update of Gnome2. They've replaced many aging libraries with their new counterparts. It includes 3d graphics (tasteful in my opinion), have dynamic workspaces and I really like the function when you're pushing the super key (windows key). The most important function is that it hardly gets in my way and I had to install less things to get the functions I really like (super - start typing to start an application, transparency...). I had to install GnomeDo and configure Compiz Fusion to get this in Gnome2 (and I still couldn't use super alone for this function). With GNOME3 I hardly every click with the mouse to start an application. I can't say anything about web (their browser) - cause I'm still using Firefox.

I think it is always hard, but sometimes open source projects have to make a cut to take a step in the right direction (and yes - some of the configuration stuff is hidden in Gnome3 and this really sucks). There are rough edges - but I think it's bold and good that they've made this step.