Conspiracy Behind Apple?

With the two latest models of the iPhone being released just about a month ago a long with their companion iOS 7 many people are ready to upgrade. Others, not ready to upgrade, are being forced to. A article written in the New York Times, which can be found here, talks about why many people are seemingly being forced into upgrading. Often when a new iPhone model comes out many people begin to notice a drastic difference in the battery life and speed of their phones. When a person notices that there iPhone is now becoming obsolete  they feel they have no other choice then to upgrade to the newest version, in this case the 5C or 5S. So instead of being able to hold on to their phones that had been previously functioning properly they now have to pay the 199+ dollars to upgrade to a fully functioning phone.

Why do the iPhones seem to start to breakdown as soon as the newest models come out? Is it just a coincidence? No, it is not just a coincidence. As stated in the article, iPhones have a limited number of charges that they can go through before the battery life starts to drastically decrease. After a year or so, the amount of time usually between iPhone updates, you begin to get near the end of your batteries charges and the life of the battery drops. Although the battery will continue to work for a long while, it will not be what it once was and to many people any insufficiency in battery life is a necessary reason to buy a new phone. It's also not just a coincidence that Apple releases their new operating system a few weeks prior to releasing the new models. iPhones dating back to the 4 and 4S era can not handle the new operating systems nearly as well as the 5, 5C or 5S. With this the speed of the iPhone drops exponentially and causes the phone to crash fairly often. This too makes many iPhone members believe it is necessary to upgrade their phone.

If Apple truly is doing something like this then how are their customers staying so loyal? With other smart phones being known for their durability how is Apple able to compete especially when they intentionally are ruining the older phones? Please share your opinions.