In your first scenario, I am not even sure we would benefit in the driverspace. Good drivers in the tree would be wonderful, but in that case why not simply work on their client, why do they need a branded 'OS?'
If they are going to be shipping a TiVO with blobs I will not call that any sort of benefit.
"I know the die-hard free software guys shudder at the thought, but let's face it: the reason Linux is struggling on the desktop is because few developers think they can make money on the platform."
Free Software and making money have no intrinsic disagreement. To the contrary, the ability to use the code commercially is one of the pillars of the Free Software definition.
But you are right, there is a market disfunction specifically in the computers and internet field. The bulk of the customers dont have the vaguest trace of a clue what they are doing. They are thus exceptionally vulnerable to marketing, and we really have a crazy market on all kinds of levels, OS choices almost being the least of it.
Marketing displaces then supercedes engineering, in the natural cycle of things. Not sure how to fix that. Presumably once us old fogies die off a higher percentage of the oncoming generation will figure this stuff out, if only out of self-preservation, and the companies will eventually be forced to shape up or die in response (though that presumes they face competition of course.)