This is true, though most of the discussion was around what these people would do to support the regular users, who are the vast majority of the community.
I just realised that probably the most important starting point was locked, and so is a long way down the list. Here’s the thread started by PSF staff with results from a large survey that was run (in the first post): Python Packaging Strategy Discussion - Part 1
The Packaging category is the place where all discussion relating to virtual environments, installation, compilation, and deployment happens these days. (Maybe there’s some in the Help/Ideas categories too, but I don’t watch those.) It’s a long way from just package publishers.
We do. But the number one thing that regular users complain about is having different tools for different tasks (see the thread I linked above).