I will say at least in my case I'm not thrilled by the lack of SD card and no removable battery. As I already am on TMobile HSPA+ is better for me, however. But with Android it seems like every phone is trade offs, and to get good battery life, latest version of android, and the nexus experience, I'll give up those things.
Sure, though personally I don't want to spend my time rooting my phone. For those who do, awesome. I don't feel like investing the time in that process when I could be doing more productive things (to me) with my day.