For the Trisquel project to thrive (and everybody here hopes it will!), it
needs *new* users, i.e., most people who will use Trisquel in 4-6 do not even
know about it now (they may not even know about the GNU/Linux operating
system). By imposing specific hardware to run the default Trisquel, the
project would "shoot itself in the foot" ("French" but maybe not
"international" expression).
I agree that this argument has limits: the system must remain useful and
attractive for people who purposefully buy freedom-friendly hardware.
Trisquel will never choose a terminal-only default to have the best hardware
compatibility!
Unless I have completely misunderstood something, Fedora developers have made
GNOME Shell work the same with or without 3D acceleration (in the latter
case, the work is carried out by the CPU, which is, today, powerful enough).
As a consequence, from the perspective of hardware compatibility, GNOME Shell
looks perfect.
