Yikes! I thought we might be heading towards a 54-40 or Fight! situation here!
Actually, I came across an article yesterday on Windows vs. the Mac that might explain a bit what’s going on with Apple (long iPhone lifecycle) vs. Android (relatively shorter supported lifecycle). The gist of the argument for Windows vs. Apple PC’s is that Apple, being a closed ecosystem, by keeping you on their product assures itself of continuing to make money from its services and additional Apple products that you might buy to go with what you already have. Whereas with Windows and free upgrades and a weak consumer ecosystem tied to Microsoft (save for gaming, which, paradoxically, Microsoft is enabling everywhere, even on iOS and Mac OS), supporting older PC’s is “free work.” Why Windows 11 won’t run on your new $5,000 Surface PC, but a Mac from 2013 can run the next-gen macOS | ZDNet
So I think you can supply the same logic to smartphones and Apple vs. Android. The Android ecosystem is so dispersed, no particular phone manufacturer can make money from selling you services or additional products while doing the “free work” to maintain your old phone on the current OS years into the future. So the wonderful competition that gives us a wide choice of Android phones (compared to Apple) also spells doom on having a particular phone work years into the future on the latest Android OS. Android enthusiasts might say that phones are still changing rapidly enough that who wants to keep a phone six years into the future but it’s nice to have that choice to make rather than have a choice forced on you.