The car i ultimately settled on has worse overall infotainment software but physical controls which can be operated blindely and reliably.
No wonder VW is already in the process of correcting this disastrous, budget driven, decision.
As a car the MEB siblings are not bad at all and by now the software is fine I hear, but they cut just to many ergonomic corners instead of accepting the costs of getting started in a slightly different market segment.
What definitely didn't help, was putting a self-declared Tesla fanboy in the CEO seat. Only Tesla is Tesla, no other brand can get away with Tesla stuff. Should have been clear for VW, as they lived of marketing to sell overpriced cars for decades.
Instead, it's almost certainly a design choice: they're easier to design around and 'feel' futuristic. Or that's what the designers and marketers think, anyhow.
The bigger cost-savings are in the touchscreen infotainment systems, where they get to eliminate the physical cost of a ton of buttons while simplifying manufacturing and parts inventory (no having to deal with a bunch of different trim parts to accommodate buttons for various options, etc.). That's probably the biggest reason why consumer pushback against touchscreens has taken so damn long to barely start having an effect.