It shows a lack of respect for their users, and for their users money.
They are charging the same for almost two years old hardware than they would if It had been updated, but the user gets a worst product, and in the long run, experience.
the solution to the problem was the correct one, they just forgot one important detail.
TELL THE USER!
As a result, plenty of people, (including myself) noticing their two year phone starting to slow down quite a bit, decided to upgrade to the new and shiny model, instead of just replacing the battery, because who would have known that was the problem?!
If you train any sport with any kind of seriousness you usually end up needing more advanced training features, like HR pacing, zones training, intervals for speed workouts, cadence..
There is no way to do all that properly with an Apple Watch as of today.
Not to mention the pain that is to wait for the screen to turn on to see if you are running at the proper pace/HR vs a Garmin watch.
If you were still a runner, or did any type of sport with decent training, you would still be using Garmin or equivalent.
Apple watch just doesn't cut it. I own both (AW2 and Garmin 735xt) and I gave up trying to use the AW for any of the sports that I do. (Running, swimming, biking, gym, Triathlon)
Because it was found out that they were doing the battery thing. If not, he and everyone else would have continued suffering a poor experience without knowing that it was a battery problem, or bought a new iPhone.
I know that’s what happened to me with my 6s at least.
Apple hid the cause (an ageing battery), and purposely slowed down peoples phones without warning.
If your phone randomly shuts downs, or it last less time between charges, you know it must be a battery issue. You go to Apple or whatever, and fix it paying no more than 79$ (maybe even free if it still has warranty!)
If you hide it and degrade performance, people don't know its a battery issue, leaving them to suffer a slow phone, or spending 700+$ on a new phone.
No matter the good intentions, and the "good solution" they implemented, they fucked up.
Thats the sort of thing that happens when you are spoiled by buying every iPhone, never experiencing an ageing phone or even an iOs update on an older phone.
Just my case, but Apple replaced my 6s battery because of random shutdowns under the replacement program on Jan 17th.
Around the release of iOs 11 (not sure exactly when because it was gradual and I was also on the iOs 11 beta) my 6s became incredibly slow, almost unbearable, until last month I decided to upgrade to an X because of how slow it was. Was planning a year more but I just couldn't see myself using it 1 year more.
Now I see via CPU Dasher and Geekbench that my 6s with a battery less than a year old (95,7% original capacity, 406 cycles) is running at 1400-900Mhz, (almost always between 1200-1000Mhz) instead of 1800Mhz.
People know batteries wear out, but the expected behaviour is the phone lasting less hours between charges, or even unexpected shutdowns, but definitely not degraded CPU performance.
That has never happened before, there was no precedent for that, and no way of knowing it was a battery issue. The only solution for most people was buying a new phone.
I also spent the corresponding amount for an X in my country but,
a. Good luck when you run out of battery on your AirPods, or you loose one, or you forget them etc. It sure is nice to have the flexibility (Not to mention the much higher audio quality with proper iems/headpphones)
b. My X is considerably bigger and specially, heavier than my 6s.
They are charging the same for almost two years old hardware than they would if It had been updated, but the user gets a worst product, and in the long run, experience.