The more I hear these rumors, the more I think that they are spread by Apple's rivals in order to reduce the amount of people that buy the next version.
A pointless task, but it's the only reason this rumor patten has been so prevalent over the last year and a bit.
Maybe competitors find it hard to accept that Apple can release one product a year and have it sell well all year where as they have to release a new iteration every few months to stay "fresh."