I'd rather not get into a huge rant and make an attention whore of myself, but I'll go with a small one.
I actually have decent gear at the moment (Darklight healing set) and tend to keep up with upgrades, so it's not really about how it affects me. It promotes carrying by friends. If a group wants to get someone built up, they'll just run them through the dungeons to get them gear, no matter how bad the player is. It's not a wall; it doesn't prevent bad players from entering areas at all and bad players are the problem, not good players with bad gear. In fact, since everyone was complaining about badly geared DDs in AK, I ran with a DRG with a 44 weapon equipped (even the tank pointed it out and laughed) that did more damage, and avoided attacks better, than one two runs later with a Garuda weapon equipped.
tl;dr
It's pointless. It does nothing. It's a policy I utterly despise.