alt Hacker NewsA key point that TFA misses (probably for the sake of story-telling) is that, unlike the 2006 iMac the author fondly remembers of, MacBook Neo is not a hand-me-down computer.
It is not the proverbial gift horse. You are paying fresh $ for it. So, it is only reasonable to have some baseline expectations on redeeming value from it.
Also, an important point of the MacBook Neo criticism is that because of its cut-down features, a Neo may never graduate to a "hand-me-down computer", but instead head straight to the e-waste pile.
ARM macs are too new for us to know how the reuse/hand-me-down/legacy support world will shake out for them. There’ll be signs when the first M1 machines get axed but for now, I have no clue.