"People I know" has never been a suitable equivalent to actual data, Mr Trump.

I'm not saying don't use it, I've used it in the past and they get some stuff right. The included programs are generally good choices, their customisations on the DEs differentiate Manjaro from others, the GUI app that lets you trivially install different kernels with the click of a button is great. Unfortunately it ended up causing breakages a couple of times, so I moved on.

I'm saying if I were to pick a word to describe it certainly wouldn't be "reliable", due to their whole holding back Arch packages but not AUR ones, leading to dependency conflicts.

I honestly don't know why they don't hold back AUR ones as well (or don't hold back a week, a-la EndeavourOS). That'd solve IMO the biggest issue with the distro

Plus the whole repeatedly not updating expired security certificates and telling people to just roll back their clocks to "fix" it.

If it happened only once, I'd chalk it up as an embarrassing albeit understandable mistake. But it's happened, what, 3 times now? It's an issue in itself, but it also brings into question what other stuff they're messing up behind the scenes due to poor processes.