Sharpening is a destructive process and the appropriate amount depends on how and what size you are using the image. It can also be easily applied anytime later. So enthusiast camera apply minimal sharpening and look under sharpened at small sizes, and phone cameras apply heavy sharpening but have artefacts if you zoom into them.

Same with saturation and 'ai' tricks like skin smoothing: users of enthusiast cameras often have different preferences.

Better or worse is of course entirely subjective. Maybe your real cameras take more neutral pictures, but people these days might expect less neutral pictures: more saturated, more HDR, more contrast.

The goal of photography is often not to look "real" or "neutral". For example, Ansel Adams took beautiful photos...but very stylized.

> And who buys a camera in this day and age but doesn't want to play with the settings? Point and shoot users stick with their phones now.

This point I tend to agree with. Imagine a device that combines the camera/photos interface of a smartphone (full screen viewfinder, touch controls, camera apps, on-device editing etc.) with the hardware of a camera (larger body allowing for bigger sensors, more lenses etc.). Basically the specs of a DSLR with an interface for the masses. Who would carry this with them? It sounds a bit like the novelty "dumb phones" that exist nowadays: very interesting, but a way too small market.