And they're generally right as well.

Tell that to jwz:

http://www.jwz.org/blog/2012/07/apple-dicks/

The fact it was eventually resolved changes nothing about how idiotic the process to that point was.

How is that in any way related to this conversation?

It's Apple proactively removing things from one of their products. They decided that XScreensaver was not something they wanted to allow and invented reasons to not allow it. Until they changed their minds.

The conversation was about Apple removing built-in hardware from their computers when making new models, not about Apple blocking third-party software.

That was an app store thing, not a hardware decision.