Hi Hilary,
Thank you for the feedback. I'm not able to speak to all of it, but will try to address the parts about ArcGIS Ideas.
We received similar feedback about not understanding that to vote on an idea, you give it kudos. We added some wording here ArcGIS Ideas - GeoNet, The Esri Community
And this is also part of the ArcGIS Ideas FAQ: Frequently Asked Questions about ArcGIS Ideas - GeoNet, The Esri Community
For the question about Labels vs. tags, check out How to use tags and labels - GeoNet, The Esri Community
In the context of Idea Exchanges, we explain labels here Frequently Asked Questions about ArcGIS Ideas - GeoNet, The Esri Community and here Frequently Asked Questions about ArcGIS Ideas - GeoNet, The Esri Community . But in a nutshell, they are helpful to the product teams who are watching those exchanges, and in some cases are used to get the idea in front of the correct development team, and in other cases they are used to help teams organize ideas.
We realize that this is a change from the previous ArcGIS Ideas site, but we put a lot of thought into how it is structured and have coordinated extensively across the product teams to help ensure a more direct connection between teams with their specific Idea Exchanges. Ultimately, we think that this will help more ideas be considered for inclusion into the products which we feel is a good thing.
One of the first things you mentioned was that there is no direct link to your ideas. Can you give me more details around that? Under My Profile, there is a "My Ideas" view as described in the FAQ here Frequently Asked Questions about ArcGIS Ideas - GeoNet, The Esri Community Is this related to your comment, or are you referring to something else?
I hope that this explanation helps. Please let me know if you have any questions about what I've shared here.
Thank you!