Should Desktop = Home?

[Steven Garrity <stevelist silverorange com>]

I snuck this question in the middle of the discussion[1] about default 
folders (Photos, Music, Documents, etc.), and got one reply arguing 
against [2] and one arguing for [3], but I thought it deserved a thread 
of its own.

Should we merge the Home directory with the Desktop directory?

There are some obvious arguments that popup in the "no" camp, including 
keeping your desktop (or your home dir) clutter free. However, people 
like to keep both as clutter-free as possible.

When I compare the contents of my current Desktop to my current Home 
dir, I don't see too much of a semantic difference. Obviously, my Home 
dir is full of hidden dirs with all of my application settings, but I 
don't see those in Nautilus anyhow.

It always did strike me as odd that from my Desktop, I have a link to my 
Home dir, which contains my Desktop - don't seem very "spacial" to me 
;-)   (kind of Escher, actually)

I see this as an opportunity to take two similar but slightly different 
metaphors (the Desktop and Home dirs) and merge them into one - making 
for one less concept the we have to grasp when we deal with our files.

Thoughts? Thanks,
Steven Garrity

[1] 
http://lists.gnome.org/archives/desktop-devel-list/2004-October/msg00018.html
[2] 
http://lists.gnome.org/archives/desktop-devel-list/2004-October/msg00026.html
[3] 
http://lists.gnome.org/archives/desktop-devel-list/2004-October/msg00026.html