Ah, the good ol' days when the only way to update was inserting a floppy disk into your computer! I'm sure one day we'll return to that model and be as safe as ever.
I've experienced broken auto-update functionality throughout my career. The only way to have a great user experience is through the App Store, which allows us to take control of our updates.
This new world of frequent app updates is just a mess, and in most cases, the updates are minor or just marketing spam.