The problem is not only having the latest hardware.
If someone already has an apple laptop it is fine but if he doesn' t and needs a good apple laptop, for exemple a 15" mbp 2.8ghz with antiglare at 2349$, and makes the mistake of looking at other laptop makers, he could see that they can offer better specs laptop for 1k$.
Those other makers probably still make some profit so that means apple make at least that much profit (apple build quality is higher but it is uses older /cheaper hardware) + an extra free 1349$ profit.
Making a small premium is certainly ok thanks to their batterylife/build quality/looks/os but here, more than 2x the price for less specs is a total lack of respect for their customers.
The arrogance apple shows by ripping their customers when they don't even try to keep reasonably (~230 days certainly seems reasonable enough

) up to date hardware or pricing because their customers can't choose other official hardware if they want to use apple's os is just disgusting and certainly makes you want to look elsewhere.
I have much respect for true believers willing to pay 2349$ now, their laptop will probably work well and do everything they need but they have just dropped their pants and given their rear and 1349$ to Steve.