Perhaps the Apple rotating on an axis refers to the patents we have seen in which imacs have a tilt mechanism along with the touch interface?
https://www.macrumors.com/2010/10/01/apple-testing-touchscreen-panels-for-future-imac/
Possible. Lord knows apple has had plenty of touch interface testing done with their iDevices, so adding that UI to the iMac wouldn't require their usual "incremental" introduction of radical new features.