Considering I spend 99% of my time either in a terminal or a web browser, I don't think it will have too much of an affect, unless the UX of either of those two are diminished. For years I used a very barebones Linux desktop (a minimalist tiled VM) and was very happy and productive with it. The former is largely why.

But I don't think the point was a 'better' desktop but an interesting or experimental one. Or simply just for fun.

We can often relearn valuable things from the past by recreating them. It's usually not enough to just look at pictures of it or hear stories. Plus many "new" UX and software problems were dealt with in the past and reappear later with new platforms, hardware, and UI concepts which start over from scratch.