Re: Software will always expand to fit the available hardware
Now, I think it's fair to believe that companies such as Apple and Microsoft do try their damnedest to make their products perform as fast and efficiently as they can
Have to take issue with this. Both companies have reliably been able to expect customers to buy faster processors and, especially, more memory. As a result, they've targeted such environments when developing.
There's already an incentive to buy a newer phone (faster hardware), but bloat provides iphone users with a disincentive not to upgrade their phone. Granted, at some point, a particular iPhone generation has had it's last update (can't put iOS 11 on my daughter's iPhone 5, for example), but Apple is all about encouraging consumers to buy new hardware every few years, they make $0 from the software.