PECL are in place just to be able to get the absolute latest stable versions of the specific PHP dependencies - as Ubuntu repo maintainers usually are not catching up, which in turn could lead to security flaws (not running the latest updates). It happened before, and will happen again.
There’s a reasoning and thought behind every decision in the NcVM. We (mostly myself) have been developing it since back in 2014, even before Nextcloud was founded. It’s solid! Stability is better than new features if you ask me.
It’s your own choice to either install everything on your own, or download a pre-configured package, but as a lazy sysadmin I would prefer the latter - a pre-configured VM made by someone who’s in love with Nextcloud and tried to make it as simple and secure as possible for everyone else to enjoy the benefits of freedom!
I didn’t have a clue about anything in 2013, so I built it mostly to help myself, then I figured, why not share it? And so I did. Now thousands and thousands of users have deployed it, and those deployments also require support from time to time, do you expect us to work for free?
Generally, if you just follow the recommendations written all over the internet (use the built in update script and update regularly) you are good to go for years to come (if not Nextcloud decide to deprecate a PHP version, and you don’t know how to upgrade) without any need for support. And hopefully, during that time, you’ve learned enough Linux to manage the PHP upgrades on your own. If not, we are here to help you - as a service - because we don’t need to really.
You can see it in two ways; either you applaud us for great work, or you think we are really stupid to charge for the services we offer. Which one are you? 