The HDMI port on mine has never been touched. I'm using it right now to control my roomba though its SCI interface. An uno with a wifi shield costs way more than a Raspberry Pi with a usb wifi dongle. Unless you need more GPIO pins or lower power consumption, Pis just make more sense.
What project that is supposed to be an introduction to embedded electronics can you think of that the raspi would be good for, and the arduino wouldn't be?
500ma is a problem. The fact that you can't easily run it off of a battery without buying additional [expensive] hardware is a problem.
Nasty attitude? If you're telling people that a raspi is a good intro to embedded electronics, then you're harming their development.
This isn't even what the raspberry pi was intended for. It was intended as a cheap machine to introduce people to programming with. For that, it's awesome, but I have yet to see anybody actually use it for that.
Your tunnel-vision is absurd. Not everyone is interested in tinkering with the lowest of low in their projects, some people want to be able to use USB peripherals immediately with zero hassle, and have a handful of GPIO pins if needed. Yeah, you can do those sorts of things with an arduino, but why bother if the power is not a concern and the hardware is cheaper?
And yes, the power is not a concern for everybody under the sun.
So in short, development is easier and more flexible (obviously), peripherals are cheaper (for the difference between the usb adapter I got for my Pi and a wifi shield from sparkfun, I would have $75 left over for an "expensive" PSU for a Pi... I mean come on... At least with the Pi you have the option of just using ethernet if you want to be cheap, with an arduino that will still set you back more than the price of a Pi), and the devices themselves are more flexible (get tired of your project for some reason? No problem, just ducttape it to the back of your TV and use it as a media-pc whatever.).
Downsides are... worse GPIO and you need to feed it 500mA. Wow. Anyone who does not find that daunting is surely an idiot.
Nasty attitudes have harmed peoples' development far more than $35 computers ever have. Your vitriol is baffling, how could something so minor evoke this? How have raspberry pis really wronged you?
I would argue that connecting something physical to the web is a great first project to ease into electronics, especially if you come from a programming background already. The circuit can remain simple to start, while providing something that is more interesting to play with than just a blinking LED.
And then there are projects like the door lock on our hackerspace which unlocks the door with an RFID-Reader and allows user-management via the web. A perfectly reasonable application for a webserver switching a relais.
The HDMI port on mine has never been touched. I'm using it right now to control my roomba though its SCI interface. An uno with a wifi shield costs way more than a Raspberry Pi with a usb wifi dongle. Unless you need more GPIO pins or lower power consumption, Pis just make more sense.