At least virtually all applications use the same configuration mechanism, which is a lot nicer than many custom formats scattered everywhere (though more and more applications seem to use .config on Linux now).
Virtually all applications for Mac OS storing their configuration in plist files is very hard to believe.
True. I use GNU stow to symlink config files from my centralised "dotfile" repo which is version controlled and distributed via git which overcomes the scattered aspect. Different formats don't annoy me too much because some programs have a legitimate reason for using particular configuration formats and it's better than trying to shoehorn domain specific languages into YAML, for example. It would be nice to have the whole system configured in a language like Lisp or Python, though.
I actually prefer programs to have their own configuration files with well-intentioned format choices. Where Linux has adopted these registry-style configurations accessible only through GUI or arcane CLI commands nobody is supposed to actually utilize, it becomes far less accessible and goes against the *nix spirit, IMHO.
That's what all those engineering dollars buy you!