Not all of your users are technical experts and we don't live for managing the backend.
The jomsocial dashboard gives no indication I need to upgrade. See: screencast.com/t/Vs36ldDso
If I don't go to the Control Panel in Joomla I don't see any indication that Jomsocial has an upgrade. screencast.com/t/1JCnMCOxJGdP
When I click on the link from control panel it takes me to the jomsocial home page. I go back and see that it was a link to the jomsocial home page and there is another link above that is not clickable. So I copy and paste and give it a go and I get to some non-sensical page. See: screencast.com/t/Mf2Y5rMwwj4

On top of this there is no easy place to reassure users that upgrades won't overwrite or break anything, that it's just like installing the component for the first time. Unbelievably bad user experience for such a great product.

HI, Peter.

Thank you for contacting us.
Please, check my answer here: www.jomsocial.com/forum/installation/356...ce-this-simply-sucks
This will be ready really soon.

We can't guarantee that upgrade won't overwrite anything. If you followed our guidelines for customization - the you're safe. But if you modified core files, then yes, they will be overwritten.