I've encountered this sort of logic before. It is certainly one way of defining "long term stable" but a more useful definition is that packages go through more extensive interoperability testing prior to being made available, so they are 3 - 6 months perhaps behind the current stuff but not years behind.

It is perhaps one of the biggest challenges for me on a Linux desktop, constantly having to choose between 'everything works' or 'has current features'. Which is not a choice I need to make with commercial desktops.