Apple's standard approach,
- Deny that they are interested in any feature the mainstream competitors already use.
- A year later, introduce the same feature, and call it revolutionary.
For example, you saw this with the screen size. Soon you'll get wireless charging and NFC. Both have Apple dismissed interest in, yet both will arrive, about 2-3 years after the competition. With proprietary technology, of course.
Spot on. But you forgot something...
Around the time that those features are gaining real traction with mainstream competitors, Apple will be about to roll out an annual or semi-annual update to hardware that could incorporate those features. Some rumors will fly that they will include such features; others say they won't.
Then Apple will launch without those features and some of us hoping for them will post the gripe, wishing they were there. Of course, for each such post, there will be about 10 rebuttals from the "Apple knows all" cheerleaders calling the feature stupid, we're stupid for wishing it was there, "pointless", "99% of the people wouldn't use it", "until support for the feature is everywhere, there's no point in building it in", "there's no space inside the <Apple device> to include such a feature", etc (the usual logic and illogic to try to rationalize Apple's decisions).
If those wanting the feature come back again, they're usually met with "don't like it, don't buy it", "Being the biggest company in the world means that Apple does know best", more 99%-type arguments, etc.
Cue the introduction of brand new subjective speculation to combat individual consumer wishes like: "...but who would want that if it
doubled the weight or thickness?" or "...but why would we want that if it might burn through the battery much faster?" and so on (most of which are usually just invented negatives to imply that including such features would add significant tangible negatives... backed by nothing of course). Coming back with reality comments like "why isn't <competitor product with those features> twice as heavy or twice as thick?" will simply result in a quick change of subject or bashing other features of the referenced competitor product to imply it's not apples-to-apples.
Then, flash forward to when Apple finally gets around to implementing the feature and some of these very same people will gush about the greatness of the feature, "shut up and take my money", "I can't believe how great this is", etc.
Then flash forward about 2+ more years and we'll remember that Apple invented the feature. Show evidence that it was invented and/or implemented by others earlier than Apple's introduction and we'll bash those others for not doing it right because only Apple can do anything Apple does right.
I've seen this over and over and over again:
- An iSight camera in iPad 1 made absolutely no sense until Apple rolled out a Facetime camera in iPad 2 and then it was HUGE
- 1080p in AppleTV 1 & 2 made no sense ("it would crash the Internet", "until the entire country has upgraded broadband technology", "the chart", and my favorite "I can't see the difference (so you can't either)", etc)... until Apple rolled out the "3" with 1080p and then it made all the sense in the world (where'd all those "720p is good enough" people go?)
- Any iPhone screen size other than 3.5" made no sense because that size was perfect per the Lord Jobs himself... and then...
- An iPad screen smaller than the perfect size of 9.7" made no sense... and then...
- "Who wants to watch video on an iPod?"
- Etc
