Let me state I like both Treks and Konas, but to imply there's some huge gap between them is pretty silly.
To review, Kona makes an effort each year to improve their bikes even if the change is very small and Trek only changes paint color from year to year, and drop lines that are successful to ones that will likely tank big time.
Or, you could say that Kona makes useless changes in cynical effort to drive sales and render nearly new bikes obselete while Trek doesn't try and waste my money just because of some date on the calendar.
Has a person ever won a UCI world championship once on a Trek downhill bike, nope.
Fair enough. Has anyone ever won 5 world championships and 2 national championships in 24 hour endurance racing on a Kona? Nope. That would be Chris Eatough. Roland Green's had a bit of success as well, unless 2 UCI cross country world championships and a NORBA national title doesn't fit the bill. My point: Cherry picking race results hardly proves the superiority of one brand over the other. So Kona has more experience with big-hit rigs. Cool, then buy a Kona if that's the kind of riding you do.
I've ridden off-road for over 15 years, and I've had a lot of bikes. My Fuel is as good as any I've ridden. The punch line here of course is that for my next ride I want a true 4-bar linkage, and
neither Trek nor Kona will fit the bill.
I just think the whole argument is pretty silly. I'm glad it appears you agree (at least on the argument end)