I actually like recoil in games, makes it more realistic and harder to get good at
I completely agree. I really like that BF3 had a lot of recoil and I like it about this game too.
There were a lot of code bugs in the BF3 beta that weren't in the release version (e.g. swimming under the ground). I think these betas are to test how their engine is affected by online traffic. I could be wrong.

Yeah, that's the official reason they give us but Jabba is right in that it's a demo because casuals don't understand the concept of a beta. The thing is that this beta actually runs pretty damn smooth in my opinion. It is lacking some stuff and it does freeze quite a bit, but compared to the BF3 beta, this is really smooth. And again, you're right about the final bf3 release didn't have a lot of bugs that were in the beta.
I don't really think graphics will improve much but I'm okay with how it looks on the PS3. Honestly, the machine is tapped out so you're not going to get anything more out of it. In any case, what we are playing now is not the final build. A little while back a bunch of Youtubers were invited to play a build that was further along than this one. We have an older build because Microsoft and Sony require certification and that takes a while.