This has a parallel to the late 90s when Apple dropped floppy disk support when it was still very much mainstream. Even the Apple II to Macintosh transition was abrupt and alienating to some in the ecosystem.

The justification is:

It makes supporting the new features and devices easier, as it focuses resources, at the expense of legacy support.

You, as an Apple ecosystem participant, pay up for the "Apple Tax" (again, a term that has been around for decades).

Just because. Any myriad of reasons could have spurred the change, from internal team tech talent reshufflings to whims in the marketing department.

This is how Apple is, and how Apple has been for much of their existence. The anger can probably be justified, but you definitely shouldn't be shocked.

May I suggest you pay for the higher tier cloud backup service on a monthly basis. Apple didn't get to a multi trillion dollar valuation out of good will exclusively. I hear service revenue is a major priority internally...

Probably ongoing support. It was no iPhone in terms of units sold.

Supported = 0-5 years

Vintage = 5-7 years

Obsolete = 7 or more years

If you buy any more Apple products, keep this in mind for product lifecycles. I will point out that Apple generally tends to be more generous than its competitors on support.

If you are not OK with this, reconsider your purchases. In cases like this, consider choosing products and workflows that use more open standards that are less likely to vanish.

More here: https://support.apple.com/en-us/102772

Also RIP my dreams about apple doing networking hardware like AirPort Express, AirPort Extreme, Time Capsule, XServe etc. It was a great time in 2000s