Nice improvements! Leadership sometimes means making tough decisions, it’s impossible to please everyone, luckily there are options available inside MATE Tweak, an awesome idea that can get even better if it worked like Budgie themes, one window showing one screenshot per theme, by the way it could have a short description of the theme below/above each one.
A link to it with a name like “Themes” or “Change the theme” could appear on the Welcome Screen so new users could easily test and choose what they prefer, because some of them never open the configurations/preferences and they have no idea that the feature is there.
Some people need to realize that MATE is in version 1.2 yet, it’s somehow a new project(a few years) and will get better and better over time. If I learned something about Linux is that things take time(and money).
If anyone want to improve any project, you can contribute with code, reporting bugs, testing new versions of packages, helping the forums, giving suggestions, translating, donating money, making videos, podcasts, blog posts, etc. There are a lot ways to help and speed things up.
Useful link: http://ubuntu-mate.org/community/