I think part of this comes down to the vast improvements in documentation over the last ~10 years. The Arch Wiki is an incredible living document for installation and configuration of all Linux flavors. The Debian Wiki isn't as clean or up-to-date, but all the AskUbuntu stuff is helpful in that realm. Installing Debian on a desktop was a headache for me in 2002, but just last week I got it dual booting on my (recently abandoned by Apple) Macbook with 100% functionality.

I don't want to downplay the great work that's been done on the software side, but my experience really reinforced the fact that improving documentation is a real contribution to FLOSS projects.