If the person is supposed to test out a distro, the stuff they will remark on is the default apps & layout of their DE first & foremost that it’s disingenuous to the larger landscape to make 67% of your recommendations are GNOME & all are the same base. GNOME’s UX sucks. Others might like it, but a lot like me probably won’t so why not include an option with KDE Plasma, Cinnamon (listed), XFCE, & maybe a tiling manager if you know the target audience well enough for your short list is a better take. Who new to Linux is going to be able to tell you the difference between Pop_OS & Ubuntu? …This is why your list of 3 is a bad suggestion--too much of the same that leads a new user into thinking there isn’t a world of possibilities.

The frustrating part at the beginning is all the under-the-hood stuff that isn’t visual like the DE. I never suggested talking about systemd, musl, pipewire, Wayland/X11, GNU coreutils, or any of that other stuff that is harder to understand.