Marco Arment on the state of Apple software

For a company that is spoken of as being so focused on execution, I wonder if this isn't all part of the plan?

They can launch an app to great fanfare which in some cases may convince people to buy the hardware. Once enough people have bought into the ecosystem, and other apps are happily filling the need the Apple created apps originally filled, Apple can let those apps flounder as they are no longer driving sales.

It's strangely the opposite approach to Microsoft which gets stronger with each iteration so that no competition comes in and takes the market from them.