Your cynicism about compliance is misplaced IMO. Compliance is about making sure the product covers things that are boring but important, like security, privacy, and accessibility. These are things that the pioneers blithely ignore so they can ship something. But if they continue to be ignored, there are real, sometimes disastrous, consequences (even if the disaster is just for one person, e.g. an otherwise well-qualified blind person losing their job because an app they're required to use is inaccessible).