Dell Mini-9 update DISASTER!

This post is about the dell-mini-9.
A netbook with pre-installed ubuntu 8.04. These machines use a separate repo for updates, (suffix http://dell-mini.archive.canonical,com) so would you expect the following to happen?

After weeks with no new packages for the standard dell-mini ubuntu repos, last night saw me pulling down 170MB.
(note - this is a vanilla ubuntu 8.04 dell-mini, first used in 'dec 08)
however, these upgrades have left me with several annoying issues.

1. an x-server update bust my uk keyboard layout. #~{}]["£ all moved around

2. New Firefox and/or WebFav packages wiped all my browser history/usernames/passwords AND removed all my add-ons. Furthermore I got an annoying "Yahoo" home page, default search and a task bar (the bloody screen is small enough, thanks)
Read again - I lost my homepage, all addons, history and bookmarks

3. the upgrading of lsb-base (3.2-4ubuntu1) to 3.2-4ubuntu1netbook1 meant that the mysql-server-5.0 wouldn't start, as I got an error about an unbound variable. Mysql is mission critical on this machine.

Anyway, I have smart friends on irc (thanks jlindsay and Peter64) and I am now fixed up again.
However, these machines are aimed at a broad spectrum of users who would be more inconvenienced than I.

For the sake of the ubuntu and gnu/linux community... please hold these upgrades back for further testing before unleashing them on new linux users.