Everyone assumes that Apple is attempting to get M1 owners to buy M2s, or M2 people to buy M3s, or M1 owners to buy M3s... or whatever.

The truth of the matter is Apple knows that Macs aren't iPhones, and that the upgrade cycle is typically 5+ years.

But if you're introducing new computers with a new set of chips, you need to benchmark them and compare them against SOMETHING. And so Apple does, against computers with known performance levels.

But for some reason the tech press insists, year after year, on writing tons of articles based on, "If you have last year's _____, should you buy this year's _____?"

With the answer almost always being no.