I think that one of the goals of MC is to be able to easily access and manage your media remotely. Standard view is the best way to manage media, which is replicated via Media Server. But there are plenty of instances where running a full Media Server client isn't feasible, which you've already established with Panel development.
A separate vnc/rdp server, clientless or otherwise, takes time and configuration that a lot of people aren't capable of, or don't want to do. That's been the idea behind a slew of MC features, like Red October and Carnac. Sure, people can install and configure their own codecs, but why not do it for them if you can? Build it in and give them a checkbox to activate it.
This was really a pie in the sky request, but I don't think it falls outside of the featureset you want to provide for your users. Panel is great in a pinch, but it's not standard view. It certainly isn't faster in its current incarnation at loading views than a vnc/rdp/nx session serving standard view.