Have you used it at all? I'm not going to pretend it's better than Bundler, we took a lot of inspiration from it and we may have a few unique features compared to it, but that's it. apt is pretty different anyway since it does system level stuff. Maven I think is insane, it does way more than a package manager should do. That said when you look at Python for example, the package management landscape is a scattered mess, and there is a new "greater better" solution every couple years. I wouldn't call that a better situation than what we now have with Composer.
I know people have their own "perspective" when it comes to Maven: some said it's too big, too complicated, yadda-yadda. Some said it's the best tool out there.
The thing here is that you don't need to know Maven that much to use it. Especially if you were to use it with IDEs.
People typically use IDE to generate the absolute minimum Maven pom.xml file initially when they set up the project. From that point onward, if you're using mostly open-source library, the OSL website will give you snippet on how to add the JAR in Maven. All you have to do is to copy paste that snippet and you're done.
People who said that Maven is overly complicated typically tried to learn Maven from Zero to Expert rather than to "just use it".
It didn't take very long for me or many of my co-workers to become familiar and use Maven effectively from not-knowing to "yes, we can have Rails-like project structure/automation , deployment and packaging for multiple environment in place".
Sometime I'd argue that there's no point separating Bundler, Rake, and Gems. You need all 3 of them and that's what Maven does (and more but you don't have to know until you do...)
Generally these are people that haven't tried anything better.
BTW, as someone who uses Composer and Bundler almost daily now (npm occasionally), I must say, Composer is right up there and it does offer some unique features that neither of the other two have.
Let me say this. Composer is probably one of the best things to happen to PHP in a LONG time.
I'm not saying I prefer PHP over Ruby, but given I am frequently tasked with providing PHP solutions, Composer is the way to go.
