GNOME started moving in that direction back in 2.4 release - GNOME 3 was where, for better or worse (my personal opinion for worse) they decided to experiment e

GNOME started moving in that direction back in 2.4 release - GNOME 3 was where, for better or worse (my personal opinion for worse) they decided to experiment even further away from the beaten path. But the seeds of what became GNOME 3 were sown in first 3 releases of GNOME 2, not in widely discussed but unrelated to actual decisions talks about patents.