well yeah but the gains from switching from svn or even cvs to a dvc system are far less than the gains from going from no version control to any.
The thing that pisses me off is people switching, with virtually no good reason, to the current trendy one. Probably because Joel says it's cool. Just pick one, use it religiously, and get on with writing some code.
DVCS provides a much smarter workflow for merging and sharing code.
Just because it doesn't have a gui as sexy or user friendly as versions doesn't mean the technology isn't better which is the point of Joels quote
If you are using Subversion, stop it. Just stop. Subversion = Leeches. Mercurial and Git = Antibiotics. We have better technology now.
The technology is better, just as antibiotics are better. However sometimes the need still arises for leeches.
Aside: Both these posts are self serving posts about competing products. Beanstalk vs. Kiln.