Can't comment on the process, while I love this dialogue. It's easy to adapt to the new spiffy UX, but my concern is with the usability outcome. I'm mostly a site builder and I train content managers and site builders, and researching components is essential at this level of WordPress work. We have extensive review and recommendation resources across the ecosystem, but the repository is the essential index for freemium plugins.

"Relevant" results are only relevant if one agrees with the algorithm. The relevant use case is typically a committee case, not something relevant to me nor any particular user. So what might be accomplished for a mass spectrum of users?

Filters and sorts are a common means to add some levers to an algorithmic output. Keyword searches are just a ticket to the fair, taxonomy lets one drill down into a vertical, and folksonomy allows for hyper-jumps. Sorting on dimensions offers more contextual approaches for what might matter in some case.

Taxonomy, filters, and sorts should be moved up from the backlog. I can dig down to find tags as filters in single listings, but why not place top tag links atop the results list? Boolean operators don't apply, but that's an old-school tactic hardly used anymore. I see that installs and recency sometimes trump matches, but I can't adjust that logic with any filters nor sorts.

Not saying the algorithm is a problem, just saying that users benefit from some transparency. UX can guide users towards those benefits in simple ways. The themes Feature Filter is an example, though not a very handy one.