Why is NAQT's distribution so different from housewrites?

[voicedvelarnasal]

Compared to most housewrites, IS sets have more trash, more science, more history, and less RMPSS and fine arts. Why is this?

[quizbowlchamp1]

Here's what I found. (via the QBWiki)
Most tournaments follow the lead of ACF in using a "per-packet" distribution, which means that categories will occur in the same proportions in every packet across the entire set (e.g. every packet will have 4/4 literature tossups/bonuses if any one packet has 4/4 tossups/bonuses). NAQT is an exception to this standard—its packet-assembly software uses a fixed distribution for each category across the entire set, then allots it across packets with some variation in the occurrence for each packet (so a single packet might have 4/4 literature, 5/4 literature, or 4/5 literature, but never 2/2).

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[Cheynem]

I'm skeptical they actually have more science, unless I guess if you count math as science.

Typically, IS sets (or any NAQT set) has more trash, geography, and current events at the expense of literature, fine arts, and RMPSS. I think a lot of times people confuse a CE and geo question for history, so that adds to the perception there is more history.

I really can't speak for NAQT, but I do think the NAQT distribution is not meant to match a typical mACF housewrite distribution. Regardless of your personal feelings, I think having a more unique distro in which (ideally well-written) popular culture, geo, and CE questions appear with more frequency is a nice counterpoint for quizbowl, particularly for newer teams and players. Sometimes I think this also helps with some difficulty issues, as I think some high school housewrites strain to find accessible answerlines and clues for fine arts and RMPSS questions. However, I will also say this leads to a relative paucity of some important academic topics, which can get even more annoying the further you go up the NAQT difficulty scale.

But ultimately, it comes down to an intentional, different choice. The NAQT distribution is different because it chooses to reward different levels of knowledge. I personally enjoy it because many quizbowl tournaments do not reward this knowledge, and I enjoy that quizbowl has various tournaments with different types of distributions.

[Santa Claus]

Here's what I found. (via the QBWiki)
[...]

This paragraph (link) is referring to how the distribution is implemented, not what the particular subdistributions are or the reasoning behind them.

As Mike notes, it is simply a choice that NAQT made. One might also ask why so many housewrites choose to follow the mACF distribution - the preference of the writing teams surely plays a role, but I would imagine that convention has a major part as well.