Is this barrelling what was supposed to be firmware fixed?

From another review....

When converting raw files without correction, barrel distortion at wide angle is much higher, at about 2.8%.... Samsung's bundled Raw Converter software automatically reduces geometric distortion (as does Adobe Camera Raw), producing distortion results very similar to in-camera JPEGs. We expect high distortion at wide angle for smaller lenses though, so it's nothing to be overly concerned about unless you are using a raw converter which does not understand the embedded "opcodes" to perform distortion corrections automatically. There is however going to be some loss of resolution and possible interpolation artifacts as a result of such strong correction, because pixels in the corners of the frame are being "stretched" to correct for the distortion

I boldened the text.

So this will be corrected as a matter of course. Does not introduce another step as I worried about.

Is the bold script above possibly less of a concern since the last firmware update? Last update was claimed to remedy some of the firmware's handling of RAW barrel distortion. Anyone's experience?

All considered what would be the point, at all, in correcting in-camera barrel distortion resulting from the lens design compromises (compactness, speed, etc) if it's simply shifting responsibility for this correction from earlier to later in the image processing chain? Seems illogical that in-camera correction prior to laptop RAW conversion would change the gist of the bold text above. No?

Additionally, shouldn't all in bold above apply to images shot in Jpeg? Some software/firmware must correct this lens's barrel distortion to wind up with a Jpeg in all cases.

Is EX2F's optical barrel distortion, in this class of camera, that bad comparatively?

Bottom line is that I'm trying to weigh all the pros/cons on this camera after three days of opening the box as early as possible to decide if it's a keeper.

Does a photographer learn to work within/around the limits of a camera's weak spots?  Recognize the need to shoot at longer focal lengths when barreling effects are going to be too obvious in a shot with lots of geometric reference?