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I use Gimp to do what most people do with Photoshop: General Image Manipulations.
I am not a Photographer or a full-time Graphics Designer (although I love hand-drawing and designing Logos)
What I don't like about Photoshop is not the software itself but the OS : modal windows.

Gimp (and most apps in Linux) - you have that freedom of floating dialog boxes instead of Modal-windows; so you can get under it.

The general averseness with Gimp is twofold:

1. People are way too accustomed to Photoshop and unlearning stuff is short of painful.
2. Gimp on Windows/Cygwin sucks sucks badly. And sadly that is Windows-users gain their first impressions of the software.

In Gimp if you are stuck - right click (navigate the menu from thereon to do almost anything).
Gimp is definitely better what it used to be (I abhored the 1.x versions), and not that sub-standard in comparison to Photoshop.
I don't deny however that Photoshop itself is an extremely professional state-of-the-art software and that in many fronts it still beats Gimp (as I keep hearing: CMYK / Pantone profiles).
But there is much more to Gimp than people are vaguely aware.

For me its refreshing and exciting the whole evolutionary (if not revolutionary) process. Sure many Linux-ported applications are still sub-par in contrast to Windows-only:

Photogenics, MainActor, QCad / LinuxCad

Some got the timing wrong and had to pull-out as Linux wasn't popular then: NetObjects Fusion for Linux and MusicMatch Jukebox.
Others were bullied by the Microsoft lobby: most notably games.
While others still support a Linux version to this date: Maya Complete and Mathematica (way too expensive I rather settle for the free Blender, Octave and Pov-Ray)

Which leads us to the Open Source:

The were have a vast library of resources just to cater for the Designer.
But sadly we got tired and old in learning new stuff.

I cannot comment on the world of Mac. Which should be more user-oriented than developer-oriented; a means to an end as you stated.

While Microsoft itself - is a damn pain in the arse. People are stucked with it for lock-in reasons including proprietory formats - that is how they bred so many software houses writing apps just for it.
Rebooting, desinfecting - recovering corrupted documents is a hassle any business and I could do without. And so .. I resist.

Use Mac / Use Linux / but using Microsoft = very unwise.

Now I'm looking to build myself a professional grade editing suite using only open source tools so that I can dump as much money as possible into the hardware.

Me too... except I don't have any money. At all. I've been browsing through: http://www.linuxartist.org/ and trying different things in their Video - Animation section.

There's a few here who do.

Looks like someone's already working on SVG

GIMP goes SVG

http://www.linuxartist.org/article.php?sid=250

Check out Linuxartist.org. They have a ton of music stuff... some of which may even be usable! :)

The DPS Perception or Reality boards are great options. The Reality board does uncompressed D1 quality video, dual streams and an alpha matte, and has a DV option. I have been using DPS boards for about 5 years and have been very happy with them.
It is a shame that they won't give us Linux drivers. Perhaps if enought people bug them ... ;)
**shameless plug **
Check out http://www.linuxartist.org/video-animation/ I keep a listing of Linux video and animation resources.
I just installed a Pinnacle Studio PCTV card to check out video4linux and broadcast 2000. There will be reports and reviews on linuxartist.org soon.

I'm wondering if anyone has seen LinuxArtist.org. There are actually plenty on quality ray tracers and 3D environments all ready available for Linux. A|W is just adding Maya to the list. This should have been done a long time ago, in my opinion.

Disclaimer: The opinions expressed are not necessarily those of Alias|wavefront. Alias|wavefront and Maya are registered trademarks of Alias|wavefront, a wholly owned subsidiary of SGI®.