Yup. Look at the whining about Storm Sigils. There’s an extremely long-tail grind for players, allowing both a quick fix of gear but also a long slow burn for gear… but people are whining that it’s just too long.
As far as ping-ponging, you can definitely see it with M+ vs Raiding. S1 was a good patch for M+ers, then S2 was geared for raiders (raiders may not like the implementation of Dom Sockets but it was clearly meant to pander to raiders), then S3 was a really good patch for M+ers (once CC opened), and now S4 is kind of raid-or-die again with the best gear coming from raids. Now DF S1 is a reaction to SL S4 which Blizzard saying they want M+ers to be able to “climb the mountain”, and then I anticipate Blizzard is going to kneejerk and make some kind of busted raid-only stuff for DF S2.
The problem is, as you say, they have no vision for the game. They just bend to whoever is loudest. It’s kind of cringe, but the correct play is to whine that you’re worse off even when things are going well for you just to avoid “the other side” getting their way (although it never works, you seem to always see this ping-pong in modern day).