I completely agree, but I think the days might be numbered. In Lightroom what you're describing, with the easy to work with plain files, is called Lightroom Cl

I completely agree, but I think the days might be numbered. In Lightroom what you're describing, with the easy to work with plain files, is called Lightroom Classic. It's still supported alongside regular Lightroom, but it wouldn't be a huge surprise if it gets deprecated at some point. It also only works on desktop. What is now called regular Lightroom requires Adobe cloud to sync between machines instead of letting you manage your own files & syncing, and is the only way to sync between the newer iPad version of Lightroom or Photoshop and the desktop.