When Artscroll Gemaros first started being published it was considered by many to be an embarrassment to be caught with one [I myself would hide mine.... It was too good not to use but people gave me "the business" when they saw me using it.]. It showed, seemingly, that one can't read a real Gemara in the original. Today it is not the case, by far. I know an elderly Rosh Kollel and Av Beis Din who learned [he probably still does] 7 dapim a day with an Artscroll that he carried around with him. While I don't think you will find boys in good Yeshivos learning during seder with an Artscroll, it certainly doesn't have the negative stigma attached to it that it might have once had. There is one Rosh Kollel I know who is really an unknown Gadol Bi-Torah. Much bigger than a lot of more famous people. He uses the Mesivta from time to time which is just Artscroll plus. And as for Baal Habatim - I think there are far far more who carry around their Artscroll than a regular Gemara.
From an interview with R' Nosson Scherman:
I have encountered a number of choshuva maggidei shiurim, roshei yeshiva, and rabbanim who use the ArtScroll Gemaras. Yet it is kept out of sight-in an upstairs bookcase, in an inner shelf. Do you have any thoughts or comments on this?N.S.: There are plenty of roshei yeshiva who say it out in the open that they do use the ArtScroll Gemara. There is one rosh yeshiva who says, “I have very limited time to do the daf hayomi, and I do use it. I also look at it to help prepare my shiurim.” He says it quite openly.
Rav Elyashiv goes through the ha’aros in the Hebrew edition when he is learning on his own to see if he missed anything and to jog his memory. He is not ashamed of it. He even keeps it on his desk. Rav Shteinman says a shiur in the Yerushalmi. He is saying his shiur on Yerushalmi from the ArtScroll Gemara itself. Big people are not ashamed to say that they rely on something. Small people hide it. It is like women ask for directions; men are too proud to ask sometimes.
