In reference to what users want: this is the point of the Open Movie projects - to have users and developers working together to add/improve features. Spring, I believe, was used to advance volumetrics (clouds, mist), and Hero was “a showcase for the updated Grease Pencil tools in Blender 2.80.” (https://www.blender.org/about/projects/) Each movie project adds and develops features in a way to make them robust and usable by, well, the users.
Additionally, Pablo Vazquez has done phenomenal work in “democratizing” input into Blender with over two years of live streams in two languages (not to mention his exceptional work since the whole covid thingy happened). He and other members of the Blender team are active on a variety of forums from Blender-managed ones (Blender dev forms, blender.community, etc.) to things like Twitter and Youtube.
Also, we should concern ourselves here with features only, not bug fixes. Bugs need to be fixed even if only one user notices them; this should not be a matter to be voted upon. The tacker curfew instituted by Dalai Felinto did great work in bringing the number of open bugs down, and the new development cadence including long-term support releases is another good step. Fixing bugs is a gnarly business, and cannot be scheduled; sometimes it just takes time (and a bit of luck) to figure out where in the code base a misstep was made.
Having a hundred thousand voices asking for improvements to the outliner is not automatically better than having 100 people asking; the devs can only do so much. And as mentioned elsewhere on this thread, hopefully Ton et al have a plan, and though they need to be flexible, there is no need to go running off in different directions every time someone shouts, “Squirrel!”
Your statement about “rights,” though is really where this discussion centers in my opinion. I disagree that users have no rights - they have the right to use, or not to use; to promote Blender, or to not. And, yes, that is about it. This is how it should be. Merely because Blender is free and open-source software does not enfranchise the whole planet. Creating some sort of voting system with a binding outcome on development is fraught with problems. The Blender folks have better things to do with their time than to explain to every user why their request is more complicated than they assumed.
I would think the better course is to promote community rather than democracy. If someone has a good idea, they should develop the idea and present it (on Right Click select, for instance). Get some feedback, and refine the idea. Reach out to other artists and the devs personally to promote their viewpoint. I have been following the Vasquez live streams, and cannot count the number of times that a “good idea” of mine has come up, only to find out why it is not yet a reality. Often it is a matter of “x” has to be done before “y” can happen. And of course, “w” needs to be done before “x,” ad infinitum.
Lastly, I am not saying do not do what you are doing. In fact, carry on, and thank you for participating in the Blender community.
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