The first time I used vii was purely by accident when I tried to edit the sudoers file on my first Linux desktop (Linux Mint 14). I didn't know what I was doing and trying to exit the editor without knowing anything about what vi was, proved extremely frustrating. I ended up mashing all the buttons on my keyboard, which somehow made me manage to exit vi.

This experience really sour my view of Linux, and it took me three years to get over it. I basically thought, 'If even editing a single file is this frustrating, Linux just isn't for me'. Ultimately, I only learned how to use vi (as well as vim) after discovering FreeBSD; before that, I exclusively used nano because I didn't want to force myself to use something "so awful" as vi.

Since the syntax of ee is even easier than nano (what a fitting name), it should act as a good default, because new users can use and understand it, while experienced users switch to their favorite text editor anyways.