Yes, that's exactly what LTS releases are for. I wouldn't use one on my personal desktop machine, but for a production server platform I specifically WANT three

Yes, that's exactly what LTS releases are for. I wouldn't use one on my personal desktop machine, but for a production server platform I specifically WANT three years out of date versions of software, since the latest and greatest may behave differently and break everything. If you were deploying Ubuntu company-wide and had custom desktop software, you'd want an LTS release on the desktop too, for the same reason. Stability versus agility is a trade-off. In some cases it makes sense to pick a fast-moving platform. In others it makes sense to pick a slow-moving one. With the combination of a six-monthly release cycle and three year support on LTS releases, Ubuntu gives you both platforms to pick from.