There is no other company in the world that would've been held to task because a customer received a 'June' delivery on June 26th; why is Apple being held to a different standard?
Two reasons:
1. Apple has a well-publicized internal policy of "Under promise and over deliver"
2. Both Apple marcom and Angela Ahrendts have stated at least once each that Apple would exceed delivery timelines.
When a company is expressing things like shipping dates to customers, they clearly cannot use personal or regional concepts of what different time frames 'feel' like: these will be wildly different from person to person, region to region. Instead, they must necessarily use universally understood time frames to avoid confusion.
Concur, but again Apple typically under promises. June gives false hope because Apple traditionally blows away delivery dates that it would be early-June. Apple should likely have promised July, and then a late June arrival would still be a positive surprise.
'June', while a wider scope than some people might have preferred (understandably), is not a confusing time frame. If a company declares they'll ship something in June, it's unreasonable for people to accuse them of lying or incompetence if they don't deliver by June 15th. Similarly, if they state a launch is happening in Spring, it's not practical to hold them to shipping everything people have asked for less than halfway through that season.
You're not wrong, but Apple has taught customers to expect things earlier than promised and with firm dates. Apple could easily have used July, or by June 30th as the date, but instead they chose to use June, and have Angela state, don't worry, it will come early.
I fully understand the disappointment in having to wait until June to get our new toys. I constantly see people with Apple Watches on and that only adds to my level of anticipation. I'm not questioning anyone expressing the idea that they would've preferred to have gotten their watch weeks ago; clearly anyone that pre-ordered was excited about getting a Watch and would rather have it sooner than later.
I bought a 38mm to tide me over until my space black comes in, and damn I'm glad I did. As an ex-Apple employee, this is even worse than the iPhone 4 launch in Canada, which is epically bad. The only thing keeping me from being super unhappy is the fact I bought the temporary watch.
The only thing I'm taking issue with is people suggesting Apple is being deceitful, lying, or incompetent because they're actually meeting the dates they gave us when we ordered the devices.