Drupal Themes - Why are there no attractive ones that are free?

The situation with Drupal themes has increasingly caused me frustration, it's pretty well known that in comparison to the majority of other content management systems, Drupal is really hurting in the theming category.

Sure there's the occassional OK looking theme but there aren't very many that may a person say “Wow, I really want to run Drupal and use that theme!”

So what is it that is creating this situation? Is it because it's difficult to theme Drupal or is it easy and people just aren't inspired enough?

Why do themes for Joomla! and WordPress and other platforms look so good in comparison yet, even though the community sizes are fairly similar, Drupal themes tend to be quite archaic or ugly (most, not all).

Yes, I know there are some that are decent looking but they are few and far between.

Perhaps it's due to the fact that Drupal tends to draw more of a coder crowd and less of a designer audience, so what can they do to turn this around?

What are your thoughts on the situation?

I don't want to turn this post into a “This theme is great, check out this link” but more of a discussion about what can be done to improve the selection because, whether you agree with me or not, it's lacking.