Don't they need it, though? People are already using layers over the filesystem, like "media libraries" and "document managers", which undoubtedly trade perform

Don't they need it, though? People are already using layers over the filesystem, like "media libraries" and "document managers", which undoubtedly trade performance for "administrivia". Maybe it'd be better if this was provided by a common layer, much like the FS already provides a layer over disk blocks.