[users] would totally freak out if they OK’d an over-the-air software update that completely changed the entire UI of their phone
Microsoft does this every year with the XBox 360, and it doesn't seem to have caused anyone any major problems. Progress is difficult, but that doesn't mean we should stop progressing.
I suspect that its a different matter of updating for Android phone users, who may not be tech savvy and have just gotten the phone the AT&T store handed them, versus the much younger and more technical Xbox 360 demographic. Edit: And don't see why this wouldn't apply to iOS, too.
> Edit: And don't see why this wouldn't apply to iOS, too.
While iOS's UI has changed somewhat since release, the changes have generally been extremely subtle; the _largest_ was 4 to 5, when a few of the widgets changed a bit.
That's including PC and web games, and I expect that these sectors skew older and more casual (implies less technical) than the console market. So the Xbox demographics are likely to be quite different to the smartphone demographic.
Microsoft does this every year with the XBox 360, and it doesn't seem to have caused anyone any major problems. Progress is difficult, but that doesn't mean we should stop progressing.